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Wired Tools

100 New Ways to Technolust!

■ * ••••#••••••#••

Where’s the

AL RHYTHM?

The Davos
Super Power Trip

Paul Allen

Gets Tough

How To: Build a
Billion-Dollar Brand
With Attitude

NASA'S Cheap

Fare to Eros

PLUS: Windows 2000
The Upgrade Lowdown

eh vm

Forget megahertz.
We’re talking gigaflops.

What makes a supercomputer “super ”
is Us ability to execute at least one
hillkm floating-point operations per
second. Like the new Power Mac G4.

Presenting the Power MacG4. The world’s first desktop supercomputer.

What makes a supercomputer “super” is its ability to execute at least one
billion floating-point operations per second. It is a staggering measure
of speed known as a “gigaflops.” The new Power
Mac' G4 is the first personal computer in the
world to achieve this level of performance.

The secret of this stunning speed is the new G4
processor with its Velocity Engine - the heart of
a supercomputer miniaturized onto a sliver of

silicon. Applications that tap the Velocity Engine’s
power typically run twice as fast as they do on the
fastest Pentium Ill-based PCs; Common Photoshop
tasks, for example, run twice as fast. And using a set of
Intel’s own tests, the 450MHz G4 chip was 2.65 times as
fast as the 600MHz Pentium III processor. Chances
are, you’ve never even heard of a gigaflop before. But very soon you won’t
be able to live without at least one on your desk. For more information and
complete specifications, visit us atwww.apple.com. 4. Think different:

fhe G4 chip incorporates the
Velocity Engine -the heart ofa
supercomputer miniaturized
onto a slhw of silicon,

*hi CFVtftu/i'itoitjtihofi jgiA © / 99®Appk Computer, Inc. Afi rixbti mmvd TteAppfe if a ne%tsfcTvtttTwfc'rmirft attd fewer Mac fhink ihfjwmt (tmf VdoctyBtgtm aw Imtmarks qfdppte Gumpufer. Inc.

Anabolic steroids build muscle mass. More muscle increases strength. In car
tei ms, this means a bigger engine and more horsepower. But this is not the
essence of a cars acceleration.Torque is. It’s the pulling power you need to
move quickly. Through turbocharging, the Saab 9-5’s engine delivers maximum
torque at low and medium rpm, the range where most driving takes place.
And with less weight, agility is enhanced. As is exhilaration.

www,saabusa,com
1 300 SAAB USA

NORDSTROMshoes.com

Make room for shoes. Get rid of everything else. The world’s biggest shoe store is here

w*. nlW 181

In the last three years. I’ve trier! our tour different online brokers.

y h i j o

Look. Just make your site fas 1 1 and easy to surf And then,

csco

pleeeease get out ol my way! Now fm at TD Waterhouse,

AOL

$12 trades and lots of irce research. Someone

DELL

its It,

Thank

you.

Big charts* E-mail price and news alerts from New'sAlert. $12 stock trades online up to 5.000 shares,

24/7 hve customer support and touch-tone telephone access. Get 10,000 American AAd van rage® miles when
you Transfer $10,000 or more into a new or existing account or open an account with $10,000 or more*

Visit us at tdwaterhouse.com

aol keyword: TD Waterhouse * 1 -SOOTDWATERHOUSE * 160 branches nationwide

WATERHOUSE

XPRS yRSLF

HHOO.frfoo*' CSCOiCWe SytteTtia, Inc. A0L:.,4mrrlftt 0nline, Inc . DELL: Ddl Computer C$rp r

©1999 TD Waterhouse Investor Services, Inc. Member NYSE/SIPC. Under no circumstance should tills he construed as a recommendation or solicitation to purchase
or sell ;t particular security Online trades: over >,000 shares incur a one cent per share charge for rhe entire transaction, AAdvantagc is a registered trademark of American
Airlines, Inc, American Airlines is not responsible lor products or services offered by other companies participating in the AAdvantagr Program* Access ro services and
your account may be limited during periods of peak demand, marker volatility or for other reasons*

WATERHOUSE

EASYAPPLICATION INDIVIDUAL • JOINT • CUSTODIAN

TD WATERHOUSE INVESTOR SERVICES, INC.
100 Wall Street
New York, NY 10005
tdwaterhouse.com * aol: TD Waterhouse

Questions? Call 1-800-934-4410

ACCOUNT TYPE: PLEASE CHECK THE APPROPRIATE BOX.

Complete and sign application to avoid delays in processing.

Include a check to fund your account ($ 1 T 000 minimum) payable to: TD Waterhouse,

Mail your application and check to the address at the left.

You can receive FREE Asset Management Features including: free check writing (intro¬
ductory package of checks will be sent) and a free ATM/VIS A check card once your
account is open. Please check here 0 to receive your card.

PLEASE DO NOT use this form for Corpomte/Partnership/Retirement/TRist/EiiUite Accounts.

D Individual D Joint Tenants with D Tenants in Common O Community Property* D Custodian for

Rights of Survivorship a Minor**+

*A(irlirkmai ii$inwtinn requiredpteavecontact TD Whterboux. **Piuvkk Minor'sinfttrmuihm inScciiun 2 andCusfcxfimllinSection 3heknv fAmerkxm Airlines 9 program lv ivdavailable far thisaccount type.

ACCOUNT HOLDER: COMPLETE ALL THE INFORMATION BELOW FOR THE PRIMARY OR MINOR ACCOUNT HOLDER.

Name: Mr. / Mrs. / Ms. / Dr.

First M.l Dirt

Social Security Number

Enti

student, etcJ

(If nor employed, indicate if rrtired.

Where would you tike your mail sent: 0 Home 0 Business 0 P,Q. Bos:
P.O. Box: t. in / Suit* / Arp

Date of Birth

mm/dd/yy

Employer Address (Street Address)

Home Addtcss: Street / City / State / Zip

(Must provide home nddrexi m*t if vou tm J PJl Bor}

Citizen of

(AdditUmtd dnwmctili v*lll i*r sent to
nmi-U.S. citizensf

Employer Address ( City, Stale. Zip)

Where should we contact you?

Dtiyilim Mime Number:

0 Ht*w i )

Bank Reference

Q awslrtCvi (

Broker Reference

Are you a director. 10% shareholder or a policy-making officer of a publicly
traded company?

0 Yes 0 No (Ifye** specify comp any l

Are you employed by n broker/dealer?

0 Yes 0 No (// yes, include a compliance letter)

JOINT ACCOUNT HOLDER : COMPLETE ALL THE INFORMATION BELOW FOR JOINT OR CUSTODIAN ACCOUNT HOLDER.

Joint Account Holder Name: Mr. / Mrs. / Ms. / Dr.

Fieri _ FU _ hat

Social Security Number Employer/Occupation (If not employed, indicate iif retired,

student, etc.)

Are you a director, 10% shareholder or a policy-making officer of a publicly
traded company?

0 Yes Q No (If yet, specify company) _

Date of Birth

Employer Address (Street Address}

Employer Address (City, State, Zip)

Are yon employed by a broker/dealer? Citizen of

0 Yes 0 N o (If yes, include a compliance letter)

PLEASE CHOOSE A MONEY MARKET SWEEP OF YOUR CHOICE. (SELECT ONLY ONE.)

If none is specified, you will automatically receive the TD Waterhouse Bank FDIC-Insuted Money Market Account as your sweep choice.

TD Waterhouse Investors Family of Funds
0Money Market Portfolio^

0 VS. Government Portfolio 5
0 Municipal Portfolio 6

□ Tax-Exempt NY Money Market Fund 7

□ Tax-Exempt CA Money Market Fund* 1

□ TD Waterhouse Bank, N.A,-FDIC-lrw>ured Money Market Account 9

ACCOUNT ACCESS. (PLEASE CHECK A OR B.)

□ American AAdvantage* Money Market
Mileage Fund-Platinum Class w

To receive your miles, please list your American AAdvanfage Account Number if you
currently have one.

If you do not have an American Airlines A Advantage account number, please call
1 -800-882-888(1 or visit American Airlines web site at www.aaxom to receive an A Advantage
account number. We cannot enroll your account without the AMR Account Number.

A. D Yes, 1 would like to trade online and receive your flat-fee stock commission schedule of $12 for
online trading; $35 for touch-tone trading; and $45 for an Account Officer.

Here is my e-mail address _ _________

As a TD Waterhouse webBwker customer, you must place the majority of your trades online to receive the fiat-fee
commission schedule.

B. O No, I do not want to trade online at this
time. I understand that 1 will receive
your standard commission schedule.

Minimum standard commission $35.

AGREEMENT TO TERMS.

By signing this Agreement I acknowledge that: (a) I agree to read and be bound by the terms and conditions of the ID Waterhouse Investor Sendees, Inc.
{TD Waterhouse) Customer Agreement, theTD Waterhouse webBroker Agreement and the Investors Money Management Agreement as applicable, each of
which will be mailed to me under separate cover, (b) TD Waterhouse does not give legal or tax advice, and will not advise me concerning the nature, potential value, or suitability for me of any unso¬
licited security transaction or investment strategy, {c) Under the penalties of perjury, I certify (it) that the Social Security Number/Tax-Payer Identification Number shown on this form is correct
and (a) that I am not subject to backup withholding under the provisions of the Internal Revenue Code. (If you have been notified that you are subject to backup withholding and have not been
informed that this backup withholding has been terminated, you must strike out (a) in the preceding sentence.) (This certification is required by U.S, Government regulations.) (d) IF this is an
Investors Money Management Joint Account each of us agrees that checks and ATM/VISA Check Card transactions may be authorized or signed by any one of the joint account holders, (e) The
Customer Agreement contains a pre-dispute Arbitration clause. Please see paragraph #9 of the Customer Agreement for full details.

Minor Sijjnalun: Ntf Require!

Accounts are carried by National Investor Sendees Corp . , an affiliate ofTD Waterhouse Investor Services , Ittc

Speed

Takes printing to a
new level. Up to 8 ppm in
black , 5 ppm in color.

Quality

Rich, laser-quality black
printing, plus 1440 x 720* bpt color
printing for lifelike images.

■With aptiHiaJ Canon specialty Paper “Estimated street price attar JM mail-in rebate Rebate riler ftcpd through IflS/WL Dealer prices may vary. Oatpu! $hqwn using apLIunal Phalli Ink. split «pai Piety.

Prints great. Prints fast.

With money-saving individual ink tanks,
this could very well be the perfect printer.

INDIVIDUAL INK TANKS. The Canon BJC 6000 Color Bubble iet™ printer Is perfect in

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BRILLIANT RESOLUTION. Need extraordinary printing? Well, expect nothing less than

perfect 1440 x 720 dpi* output thanks to our unique Drop Modulation Technology.™

PHENOMENAL SPEED. With a perfect balance of form and function, the BJC-6000 prints at

a blazing 8 ppm in crisp, laser-quality black. Or 5 ppm In beautiful color. For more information, visit

our Web site at www.ccsl.canon.com/6000 or call l-SOO-OK-CANON.

Canon

Ink

Large, individual ink tanks save you
money, and the optical ink sensor indicates
when a color is running low r .

Value

Ail this for only $149?*
including our exclusive Canon
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©1939 Canoe Computet Systems, Inc;Canoe arid am ti&stemd Trademarks amt Buhhfe tel. Drap Modulation Technology and Carton Think Tank System are tradoinarks ot Canon Inc. in Canada, call I SOa-263 1121.

The Canon BJC- 5100

Speed

Dual-cartridges push laser-quality
black output speeds to approximately
10 pages per minute*

Quality

Incredibly rich and
vibrant color with 7-color***
1440 x 720 dpi** printing.

"Efeinfc tiwi SC-23 Enhanced Biach BJ’ Cs PlndgKs, Second BC-23 Cartridge animal. “On Caron Specialty IVr —pnrriins wlrh afma\ Photo BJ CartiiiSge and Carnn Spatial! y Paimr. tEelimaierl straf

10 pages per minute
add up to one very fast printer

PURE SPEED. Need to get some paperwork done? At 10 ppm In black* and

4 ppm in color, the Canon BJC-51Q0 Color Bubble let " printer is lightning-fast*

1440 X 720 DPir The BJC-5100 offers stunning high-resolution color and

black printing, allowing you to create text and color images with pinpoint precision.

7-COLOR INK SYSTEM. The BJC-5100 mixes seven individual Inks to create

color images. The result Is astounding photo-quality printing!"

PAPER SUPPORT. A truly versatile printer, the BJ&5100 supports a wide variety

of paper sizes from 4” x 6" all the way up to 11." x XT” For details, visit our Web site

at wwwxcsLcanon.com/510O or call 1-80Q-0K-CANON.

Canon

Value

At $1491 the BJC-5100
offers incredible value and unbeatable
paper versatility.

price after (30 mall-m rebars. Dealer price* mar vary. Rebate offer goad liiruug.1i 1/29/flO. ©1999 O&iion Cuminilei Spleiim, Inn Canwi, BJ, BJC and Bubble H are trademarks of Canon lac In Canada, call J-Bao-2G]-im

The 300-horsepower GS 400, It's fast.

@1999 .Lexus, a Division of Toyota Motor ita/es, USA., Jnc Lexus reminds you to leeur seatbelts, secure children in rear nat> obey all speed Jews and drive responsifdy., For more m/brrnchon, vmf our Web site at w'w'u'./pxus.com or call SOO-USALEXUS (800-872-5398),

www.damn that’s sweet.com

Irresistible watches, pens, jewelry, fragrances, leather goods and
other fine accessories. Over 250 world-class brands including
Rolex, Cartier, Breitling, Versace and Chanel. All just a click away.

ASHFORD.COM

All the stuff you really, really want.

www.ashford.com / 1*888*999-4645 / aol keyword: ashford.com
The brands listed above are the respective trademarks of their owners and are not affiliated with Ashford.com

Now ft's easy to get to the far comers of your imagination. A place where your most outrageous ideas come alive. Where creativity and business
objectives actually merge. Begin your journey with an unexpected transport device. Samsung monitors. Yes, Samsung, We + re the #1 manufacturer
of CRT and TFT displays in the world. With technology that lets you travel to new visual landscapes. We have the credentials and the awards to
prove it. Now we're ready to take your ideas to a revolutionary new place. Samsung. Our monitors will change the way you view the world forever.

For more information, call 80G-SAMSUNG, or visit www.samsungmonitor.com

ri cr-1

ELECTRONICS

SAMSUNG S70p Plus TFT

NTSC composite/S-video input
Edge-to-edge or PIP video viewing
16 color half-tone OSD

■ Zoom images up to G4x
• Advanced image scaling

■ 2.5 s ' thick

160 degree viewing angle
Portraft/landscape viewing

• 1280 x 1024 (with downscaling)

* VESA wall mount

The Power of Samsung

Penn & Teller

Introducing

Powerstreet"

ONLINE TRADING® FIDELITY.COM

Online trading gets personal.

As you might expect, Penn and Teller don't take the same approach to
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Lycos—for an investing experience you can customize to fit your unique
way of doing things. You also get access to real-time reports from
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Lycos is a registered trademark of Carnegie Mellon University,

MarketWatch.com Inc. is an independent company and is not affiliated with Fidelity.

Palm VII is a trademark of Palm Computing, or 3Com Corporation, independent companies that are not affiliated with Fidelity,

Si4.95 for stock trades placed vie the Web or InstantBroker 5 " in qualifying accounts (minimum 12 stock, bond, or option trades in the prior 12 months).
Fidel ity Brokerage Services, Inc, Member NYSE, SI PC

87264

Eddie Bauer online: As safe as, as easy as, and
is so safe, it's like Fort Knox with Dobermans. And
navigate, and it has the most Eddie Bauer stuff
and a virtual dressing room, if it were any more

■d a= '~ JS

almost as fun as. Shopping Eddie Bauer online
it/s so easy, it's a walk in the park: it's fast to
in one place. And fun? With weekly specials
fun, you'd be in the barrel with the monkeys.

www,£DDI EL 13ALJER.com

www.defytherules.com

Adobe® software lets you
do the impossible on the
Web. Go. See for yourself.

Inspiration becomes reality.

Adobe

Warn#

Team Protects

TpiMitty

1 Adventure

Worts Digital Dashboard

Competitors Best Practices

Contacts

Metrics

8udget

It will change the way you work.

Heck, it’ll change the way you drive home from work.

Introducing Digital Dashboard, powered by
Microsoft* Office 2000. Digital Dashboard helps you
make better business decisions by letting you see
everything from revenue goals to rush-hour traffic on a
single screen. It also lets you integrate and filter e-mail,
key documents, real-time data, and even Web-based
information to suit your business needs. Plus it gives you
one-click access to Office applications like Word 2000,
Excel 2000, and Outlook* 2000 so you can quickly drill
down to the details to see how they affect
the bigger business picture. To find out
how Digital Dashboard can sharpen your
business reflexes, visit our online demo at
www.microsoft.coin/go/DigitalDashboard

Microsoft

iicrosort

Omce20ooEl

Where do you want to go today?

Microsoft

© 1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved, iVHnra&nfi „ itie? Office logo, Outlook, and Wtera do you man? to go today? are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation In the United States and/ or other countries,

e-centives [E-'sen-tivs] n. Personalized online coupons and special offers from your favorite brands—ready to redeem
when you’re ready to shop.

y No two consumers are looking for exactly the same thing, but some of
today’s smartest companies are using the Internet to give them exactly what they want

available through:

Excite® Home

—with e-centives™.

ZD Net

e-centives enable marketers to acquire new customers and build brand loyalty
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consumers’ profiles are safeguarded to ensure privacy.

Using e-centives’ Campaign Manager™, marketers can easily launch and manage
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and beyond marketers’ sites through an integrated network of online partners like
Excite@Home, ZDNet and more. Consumers can act immediately on e-centives
presented to them across the Web or save them to their own personalized online

ShopSports.com

egghead.com

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proflowers.com

USATODAY.com

computershopper.com

NextCard

Gift-Ties

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and more...

organizer. So e-centives are ready to redeem when they’re ready to shop!
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personalized

private

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5 .ju;

Turn your desktop into a digital photo darkroom! Introducing Jet Print Photo — a new line of digital photo-finishing papers.
Jet Print Photo offers a complete line of specially-formulated papers to support a range of image output and resolution
needs. Look for Jet Print Photo where digital cameras and computers are sold.

Fairfax County is home to more than
2,000 leading information technology companies.

In a world where technology changes overnight, there's one place where the conditions for change never change
a bit. Where companies like Cable & Wireless, Oracle, Nextel, Concert and Network Solutions can count on access
to three major airports. Where the schools are among the nation s best. Where the world's largest customer for
information technology, the federal government, is right next door. Want to change the face of information technology?
Then change your business address* Call 703-790-0600 or visit our Web site. And join us in Fairfax County,

FAIRFAX COUNTY, VIRGINIA, PLATINUM SPONSOR OF THE 2000 WORLD CONGRESS ON INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY,

www.FoirlaxCounlyEDA.org

wear

com

Fine diamonds, jewelry and luxury items from around the wor ld

Your mother
should
be this
approving.

Instant online approval. WWW.0ri3.COm

There are some things even a mother can't give.

Apply for an Aria Visa® at www.aria.com and you can be approved for a new account in a flash!
Aria also offers the lowest possible introductory APR on purchases and balance transfers,
generous rewards, and a growing list of online shopping advantages.

So apply today. And don’t forget to e-mail your mother.

(

space

for your sounds

i -t * nve * corn

i-drive.com is personal internet space for documents, photos, and music.
It’s the best place to manage your MP3 collection. Click “save to i-drive” at
MP3.com, and we’ll double your space to hold nearly one hour of MP3’s.

personal internet space

your MP3s. your photos. your documents. your space.

Now the exclusive internet file
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Enjoy Black Label Responsibly.

WELCOME TO CIVILIZATION

234

312 Where's Tech Support When You Need It?

Everyone thought Al Gore and the Valley were a natural match.
Think again. By Karen Breslau Plus: The Gorecard

344 Breaking Protocol

Forget Y2K. IPv6 is here - the Net's first major upgrade ever
By Nick Montfort

348 Eye Witness

Photojournalist Flip Schulke's era-defining images go digital.
By Jessie Scanlon

Cover James Porto. Model: Edisa Weeks.
Introduction: Photographs by Kevin Kelly.

Wired Tools

With the right tool, you can do it better, faster, and, well,
more conspicuously.

Plus: Screen-Age Idols, The 11 Factor, Kids' and Global Tools

324

332

NASA's Cheap Fare to Eros

With gravity in your gas tank, the shortest line between two
celestial points becomes a cosmic loop-de-ioop. By Oliver Morton

Cute Inc.

What can you say about a high-powered exec with an Elmo
charm on his cell phone? He gets it. By Mary Roach

350 Global Power, Straight Up

Klaus Schwab, mastermind of the World Economic Forum and
its Davos confab, has built the stickiest site on the planet.

The Wired Interview, by Orville Schell

360 The 38-Gigahertz Breakthrough

How a telecom upstart called WinStar took broadband wireless.
By Charles Platt

395 Dump File

The Trash contains 100 items that shouldn't survive the 20th century.
Hit Delete now. By Tim Cavanaugh

(IF YOU HAD AN ACCOUNTANT.)

YOUR ACCOUNTANT WOULD LOVE IT.

■V.' ijB

:& V'

PROOF THAT YOU CAN AFFORD BOTH A CAR AND A LIFE. A 160 -HP TURBOCHARGED
ENGINE. SEVEN-SPEAKER AUDIO SYSTEM (SIX-DISC CD CHANGER OPTIONAL). FOUR-WHEEL DISC. BRAKES WITH ABS." ' ‘

www.volvocars.com or 1-800-550-5658 MSRP of vehicle shown with optional metliit pfiint-ls S2*500. Price aoesniot include la*: title *ri*de : ^WioricMti roes

1 PLANTRONICS

It's all in yaur head.

Da your own thing with new Plantronics PC headsets*
x Work ar play, we immerse you In the multimedia
experience. Bn you focus on tfvhat's important, not
r what's going on around you, Plantronics PC headsets
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Choose your model and get baEk to working hard - or
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1-8□□-54-4-4660 www.plantronics.com

HEADSETS AS UNIQUE AS YDU ARE

® PfontronlM 1999

IT’S ALL IN THE CARD

THE FUTURE OF DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY IS HERE WITH

ILMJU

ENABLED

Introducing the world's first USB Enabled
digital film. The fastest digital film on the
planet now comes wilh built-in desktop
connectivity We've built ultra high speed
USB connectivity directly into our new
digital film, allowing you to easily connect
to any USB ready PC or MAC. We even

LEXAR

USB ENABLED DIGITAL FiLM

include the JumpShot™ USB cable. Now
you can transfer 64 MB of digital pictures
in about a minute To learn more about
Lexar Media's new USB enabled digital
film, contact us at 1.800.789 941B or visit
our website at www.digitalfilm.com.

Taking pictures at the speed of life m

Available at CompUSA. BEST BUY. 8&H Photo, Cameraworld.com, Fry’s Electronics and other leading stores.

m Is

138 INFOPORN Raw data

DEPARTMENTS

RANTS & RAVES Reader feedback
ELECTRIC WORD Eye -popping

MUST READ:

109 Net free for all...

112 Video voyeurs' eyes wide shut...

112 Meatspace: Valley stress buster

114 Patrick Naughton vanishes!...

120 People

126 Jargon Watch

128 Under the Hood: Cyranose 320

134 Saving Mir...

148 Got Risk? Talk to Clay Struve, quant savant. He's the guy that
big money banks on. By Edward Cone

160 Code Warrior Microsoft's head honcho for Windows 2000
seeks perfection. It's a lonely crusade. By Chip Bayers

174 Supreme 0 it all started with a pair of sunglasses. Inside Oakley's
bid to build a billlon-dollar brand with attitude. By AndrewTilin

192 Click Dynasty A Beijing software power and a Silicon Valley startup
are merging to become the Chinese AOL. Only bigger. By David Sheff

204 Think Tanked The memo from Paul Allen to Interval Research
was loud and clear: Give me less R and more D. By Thomas A. Bass

373 STREET CRED Consumer reviews

Including Soul Calibur f<< the empeg car stereo ... The Day Traders
Plus: Music, Just Outta Beta, ReadMe

388 BEST Great stuff - tested and approved

Time capsules, portable gas generators, and multitools

391 NEW MONEY Ourgnide to personal finance
Plus: The Wired Investment Portfolio

432 What Does It Do? The Wired Contest
Win your own Harley XL 12005

coach] NEW PYTHON SUM COIN PURSE#6172 $l28/liP5TlOK CASE #6170 $78/WWW. COACH .COM

WWW

COACH

November 12, 1999 $1.49

The world masses
are fed and nobody is
turned away hungry.

Turn to pg. 9 for story

INTERACTIVE TV ENDS

New York - Nations worldwide are celebrating, as the age-
old conundrum of how to feed the planet has finally been
solved, thanks to interactive television. It’s quite amazing,
scientists and philosophers speculate that interactive TV

knew interactive television would be the greatest thing
since sliced bread, wc just didn't know it would actually
help creat£jjj^jii«lifig^bread.''

'^typological experts now
*-Hko usher in the
world
to

YOU'VE HEARD THE HYPE. NOW HEAR THE REALITY.

And the reality is this: OpenTV is the world's leading provider of interactive software
for the digital set-top box. Together with television partners worldwide, we've brought
interactive television to over 3.5 million households across the planet. And we're doing
it on all digital television platforms including cable, terrestrial and satellite. In addition,
we've paved the way for the next generation of interactive television with services like
on-demand weather, enhanced broadcasts, e-commerce and interactive advertising.

Which means new revenue streams for TV operators. And it's only the beginning. This
year we're set to debut OpenTV in America on EchoStar's DISH Network™ Hype? Well. The world leader in interactive television."

were not promising we can end world hunger. Just provide an appetite for a better
form Df television. OpenTV We're making the promise of interactive television a reality.

OpenTV, Inc. (US) 650.429.5500 www.Qpentv.com

©1999 QpenTV, Inc. OpenTV and ihfl DpenTV logo art trademarks flf OpenTV Inc, m lie Untied Sues af Anwica and alia ccmtiuiei DISH WerMtirk 1 “ 6 a rfigtaeted trademark of EtftflSto ComtiiuratatiDiE, CbmoratiQn, All tadanarks are iln property of liar respective owntirs.

*t«***l

everywhere.

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Interns: Sen Schnayerson (Research), Heather Allison Sparks (Edit)
Photography Director: Christa Aboitiz

Senior Writers: Chip Bayers, Warren St John
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Copyright ©1999 by The tond£ Nast Publications Inc, All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited.
Wired (ISSN 1059'1028) 3s a publication of The Conde Nast Publications Inc.

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R a r n a t v s

E S

Getting Wireless

The Nokia 9110 Communicator shows that much of the
promise of cellular technology is already available today
("Just Say Nokia/' Wired 7.09, page 134).

The Communicator has completely overthrown my white-
collar workday routines with a shock of liberation. While
hesitant dealers still wonder why this bulky brick of a tele¬
phone finds such lusty buyers, I have been happily typing
away on the tiny keyboard for more than six months, cele¬
brating my post-office - and, yes, post-
Windows - life every time I use it.

Author Steve Silberman's report treats
the Communicator like it ts a product from
this side of the mobile-connectivity revolu¬
tion - but it isn't. It's from beyond. In my
view, it's almost a communist tool, putting
an end to some of the alienation in white-
collar work. Every world citizen should be
entitled to one.

Uwe Lucas

lucas.lak-hh@home.gopas.de

Most of the tech no fogy predictions mentioned in
"Just Say Nokia" are at the top end of the potential
curve .These ideas still have to be implemented by
companies tike my wireless provider, which insists

After reading your cover line/How
Nokia Will Wireless the World/'
and the article inside, I couldn't
help but wonder:When Nokia
succeeds, will you call your maga¬
zine Wiredtess or Wirelessed?
Steve Hoffenberg
stevehof@lyra.com

on putting me on hold while
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actually making calls.

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anradeusb4@yahoo.com

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Net Self-Worth

Sudden wealth syndrome ts more
than just a bitch (It's a Bitch
Being Rich/ Wired 7.09, page 76).
Our work at the Money Meaning
& Choices Institute is not just
about the emotional pitfalls of
success and wealth - it's also
about the opportunities that the
new, rich dot commers have to
make a difference in their lives
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As a rapidly growing social
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you hear it or you risk wasting
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financial values, helping people
find balance: between time and
mo n ey, a nd b e tween se I l re la t io n -
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Stephen Goldbart
and Joan DiFuria
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& Chokes Institute
www. m mcinsti t ut e. com

Through the Lenz

I was a student and friend of Fred Lenz before he
lost his soul to the almighty dollar and the obses¬
sion for power ("Street Brawl in the Twilight Zone,"
Wired 7.09, page 174), Yours is one of the more
comprehensive articles I've read since his death. I'm
glad he's gone and hope his students regain their
individuality and find true spirituality as they move
forward through life.

Nancy Peham
npeham@texoma.net

Charity Parity

Hurray for Silicon Valley s new philanthropists
("Nonprofit Motive/ Wired 7.09, page 110). For
more than 60 years I've made contributions to
various "charities/In my old age I've discontinued
most contributions, but I am certainly in favor of see¬
ing some results from all this giving. If philanthropy
can become more accountable/those responsible
for the IT revolution and the new economy are the
people who can make it happen.

Laurel Silverton
74731.3343@compuserve.com

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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Unsexy, Unstoppable

AOL is a piastk, controlled Internet with none of
the anarchy and confusion of the real thing - the
digital equivalent of a gated community ("Over 17
Million Served/' Wired 7,10, page 112). Steve Case's
Terms of Service agreement tries to ensure that no
one breaks the rules, swears, or disrupts the mellow,
unchallenging atmosphere.

Paying your ISP to get on Yahoo! Chat Is not

necessarily cheaper than paying
AOL to use its chat rooms. But to
sign up with AOL you must pro¬
vide your credit card or checking
account number and, by exten¬
sion, your real name, address,
and telephone number.

For millions of people, this is
acceptable. But for others, free¬
dom in the form of anonymity is
something to be cherished,

John Bakhta!
john@baichtal.com

Literary industrial Complex

John Brockman incites all independent authors to
participate in a sort of intifada against publishing
houses that are dominated by media conglomer¬
ates ("Agent Provocateur," Wired 7.09, page 98).

I live in Brazil, where many editors are puppets of
the same conglomerates, and Brockman's outcry
is music to my ears.

The concept of replacing the conservative,
industrial publishing process with cost-cutting,
inventive, digital distribution signifies the end of
the best-seller profitability model, and the begin¬
ning of wider access to alE creative literature. It will
no longer matter where the writer and reader are
located. Amazing.

Ilidio Soares
ilidioso@zipmet

I loved the quote by John Brock¬
man: "Companies are like Roach
Motels. Good people go In, and
nothing comes out." I have seen
this for myself over and over
again. It goes a long way toward
Lisa Margonelll's description of explaining why anything Mi era-
AOL's community leaders (Inside soft produces Is so full of bugs I
AGL's'Cyber-Sweatshop/" Wired David Cook

7.10, page 138) reminded me of dcook@cookware.com
what it was like to work as a beta
tester for Microsoft, which I did for a few years until
I decided the company was getting the best of the
deal. They got in touch with me, flattered the hell
out of me, told me how great and wonderful it was
for me to be exposed to their new technologyjhe
Microsofties ended up motivating me to think I was
on a great and noble crusade, and 1 pissed away
hours and hours testing, isolating, and reporting
all their damnable bugs. Maybe there should be
a class-action suit against Redmond on behalf of
all its beta testers.

Ben Myers

benmyers@ma.ultranet.com

Burn Rate

In "Virtual Book Burning" {Wired 7.09, page 68),

Mike Romano takes Amazon.com to task for remov¬
ing The Committee from Amazon.co.uk and temporar¬
ily pulling A Piece of Blue Sfry from its US site, noting
thaf'the Church of Scientology has been aggressively
going after online content it deems objectionable"

The Simon Wlesenthal Center in Los Angeles Is also
pressuring Amazon.com, as well as barnesandnoble
.com, to remove quite a few books from its German
site, and there is no outcryJhe center claims the
booksellers are breaking German law by carrying
Mein Kompf The Protocols for the Learned Eiders of
Zion, and other titles, [It Is illegal to distribute litera¬
ture that supports Nazi ideology in Germany.)

Should Amazon.com be liable in a German
court for selling Mein Kampfl If so, surely it might
be liable in an Iranian court for selling Salman
Rushdie's The Satanic Verses. Do we want a truly
open Internet,with any information available to
anyone, anywhere? Bomb-making manuals, hate
literature, pornography, Free Tibet sites, Rushdie
novels: All could be illegal in one country or another,
Tom Cox

tough_tom@yahoo.com

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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Glenmore Special

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Fleischmann’s Royal Vodka

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Mr. Boston Vodka

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Barclay's Vodka

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Amazon Vodka

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Schenley

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os needed.

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e e

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T S

A V

SpamTrak

I wanted to thank you for your report on
GlobalTrak ["Anatomy of a Spam," Wired
7.10, page 144). While it wasn't very flat¬
tering to me personally, I think it was a
very good portrayal of the company. Ail
of the licensees with me were, and still
are, friends. Like me, they wanted to save
the world and make a difference. I was
hu rt financially and emotionally when it
became dear that the promises were pipe
dreams. If your article can stop one other
person from spending a dime on this ven¬
ture and others like it, it would be well
worth it. I know I speak for all of us when
I say thank you and kudos for a great job!

And my suit, by the way, was not cheap.
Daniel K, Holmes
danielkh@aol.eom

The Zero Effect

I've just finished Kevin Kelly's'The Roaring Zeros" (Wired
7.09, page 150), and I'm flabbergasted that a seemingly
educated, intelligent person could be so naive. Forget about
current market conditions and futuristic hand-waving.
History teaches us that inevitably the good times come
to an end, no matter what. Arrogant optimism fueled by
technology brings to mind the mood at the end of the last
century, and what was the result? The Titanic and World
War I, to name but two.

Prosperity and growth are
by no means bad things,
but they are no guarantee,
nor are they a birthright.

Warren Frey
wfrey@powersurfr.com

So the Dow will hit 50,000 and everything
shall be peachy forever? In fact, you say,
we will be able to buy lots more of every
thing, and even have our own personal
assistants.

But who is This "we" who will have
gaggles of personal assistants? Certainly
not the personal assistants themselves. So
this "we" must be a pri vileged upper class
of technocrats with several layers of sub¬
servient drones doing their work for them.
How utopian!

It's an oft-proved truism on Wall Street
that when the mass media starts running
front-page stories about how the good
times will go on forever, it's time to short
the market.

Bob Morris
bob@bomoco.com

Undo

Hardwired: Waldo Jaquith's 384K connection
("Bell Hop," Wired 7.09, page 36) is a multi¬
ple virtual line, not wireless. - Retrained:
Bombardier was not involved in Alstom's
development oftheTGV in France (Tower
Trip," Wired 7.09, page 50).-Un-Finnished:
Yrjo Neuvo was a professor at the Tampere
University of Technology, not the University
of Tampere ("Just Say Nokia," Wired 7.09,
page 134].Additionally,Finland has never
had a fully socialist economy.

Got Wired. Online,

w w w. w i re d xo m/ w i ro d

Dive into the magazine's recent Issues,
search our archive, or subscribe online.

www.wiredxom/wired/repnnts

Order reprints of seminal Wired
magazine articles.

Send your Rants & Raves to:

Email;

mts@wifed.com
Snail malh

Wired, PQ Box 191826
San Francisco, CA 94109-9866

Editorial guidelines:
guiddines@wired com

Editorial correspondence:
editor@wired.com

SONY

Everyone's talking about digital convergence.
But only one company truly delivers.

Sony UA tO Direct

© 1999 Sony fiectroncs Inc, M r$ti* reserved t^odudan In wMs or In port without written penrtssion is prohibited Pices, jpeottaaltaris ond promotions otb void only in he U.5. Prices. specifications and promotions do not inducfe oppliogbfe sotes kw o ihtppng end honcfcig.. end ae subject fa charge wilhaii nc*a?. Sony.
VftlO, i.UNK. Memory Stick, £K>5 SuperSWi Pra, PldureGeqr, PVgpte, the WO lege, 3 Mch-h ond the Sony dgp cte liademrsiks d Sony. .Sorry WfO Direct is n seMce mak af Sony. ond Planllun are hnebnadis d Insd Carpantafl. JVjttaaofl rmd Vtffdawj qre Irodbmgjii of MJooiOft CapctaHcr’ Al dhen ttidemtrki aw
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* 4X max. DVD-ROM drive with DVD movie
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Microsoft Word 91
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• 8 MB Memory Stick media MSA-8 A $ 39.95
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©1999 Sony Electronics Inc. All righrs reserved, Reproduction in whole or pnif without whiten permission rs prohibited Prices, specifications ond promotions are valid only in l+ie U,S and are subject lo
chonge without notfce. Sony VAJO Dliect 15 o service mark of Sony. Sony, VAIO. Mavico. Z505 SuperSltm Pro, FD Trinitron and rhe Sony logo ore trademarks of Sony. Note: Images on screens ore simulated.

tm i

I don't like digital/'says Daniel Rozrn,
director of research and an adjunct
professor at New York University's
Interactive Telecommunications
Program."! use digital. My inspirations
are all from the analog world/' Wooden
Mirror, Rozin's latest creation (on view

at program headquarters at 721
Broadway), reflects this tension. The
6-foot-tafl video display consists of 830
pieces of gold-toned pine, each wired
to its own tiny servomotor. Stand
before it and a hidden camera feeds
your image, in real time, to a souped-up

Macintosh, which parses you into
an 830-byte video signal. The Mac
then tells each motor to position its
pinewood pixel to reflect a specific
intensity of light.The result: the world's
first live animated woodcut.

- Steve Bodow

Wooden Expression

What would it take to make you happy?
Whatever it is, try boxLot.com, or call
l-877-4boxLot. There’s no better find
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One-Night Stand

December 31 is opening night for Times Square
2000, the biggest showstopping spectacle in
Broadway history. The headlining diva, seen
here in her dressing room, is the new ball, set
to drop from atop One Times Square at 11:59
p.m. EST.

"We're using technology that usually runs
an entire Broadway production to control one
ball/ 1 says Countdown Entertainment president
Jeffrey Straus. A dimmer board controls the

ball's 788 elements: 224 colored lights, 208
dear lamps, and 96 strobes beneath a skin of
industrial plastic and Waterford crystal, plus
168 external halogen bulbs and 92 mirrors
mounted on individuahservomotors.

If that seems a bit over-the-top, keep in mind
that the ball's light show will begin a full 13
hours before the fall. In Times Square, where
stars are born, this one must be precision-
engineered, -John Aboud

.-VSV^''

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

Make the Internet sizzle with digital audio

With so much music now available on the Internet, listening to music on your PC has become commonplace. So why compromise,
when new speakers can make all the difference?

Plug in the latest Cambridge Sound Works speaker system. Sound Works® Digital, and your Internet audio will sizzle with rich
full sound. This powerful subwoofer speaker system digitally connects to Sound Blaster Live! sound cards for crystal clear audio.
Let Creative® the leader in personal audio, provide home stereo sound to your PC,

Upgrade to any Cambridge SoundWorks speaker system and instantly experience great audio on your PC. The difference will amaze you.

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DO YOU HAVE

THE RIGHT READ

ON THE FUTURE OF BUSINESS?

We do. We're Red Herring and when it comes to the business of
technology, and all the business that technology touches, we have the
uncanny ability to see the future first and the expert insight to tell you
why it matters. So you can matter.

www.redherring.com

REprurern

BUSINESS NOW

Suppose the Y2K glitch crashes the network of
networks and renders our machines useless.
What would we do with all the defunct gear
that once kept us wired?

CMY2K, a guide to the new millennium
created by John Klotnia and Brett Traylor of
the New York-based design firm Pentagram
iwww.pentagram.com), offers several inventive
ways to repurpose your tech accessories.
These range from planter boxes made of disks
to a hollowed-out laptop as cosmetics case
to computer-cable shoelaces.

The guide -"a little goof' created for
Pentagram client Mohawk Paper Mills - is
intended to demonstrate how well a certain
stock of paper responds to four-color, digital
printing techniques. But with its supervivid
images and witty captions, CMY2K succeeds
in making its meta-point: As a medium, paper
will endure - and not just because it's Y2K
compliant - Brad Wieners

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

□ 6

The travel supersite with dining, hotels, nightlife, transportation, and shops that sell souvenir steins.

CONCIERGE.COM

Whatever your plans

Softwear

Last yean facing a mild case
of carpal tunnel syndrome and
a severe case of corporate
burnout Matthew Clark left
Microsoft.The 27-year-oid
designer opened Houston
( www.wehaveaproblemxom ) -
a gallery and design studio in
Seattle - last summer and will
introduce User-Friendly, his owf
line of clothing, in late Novemb
He describes the garb as fashioi
for the no-collar workforce.
Imagine a Worth Face-meets-
Prada style for computer geeks,
The line includes pants with
interchangeable pockets (they
snugly fit any cell phone or
handheld), terry-doth wristban'
with thumbholes for added supp
during long typing sessions, am
even asymmetrical shirts with
thumbholes and wrist padding
for heavy mouse-users.

- Adam Glickman

You’ll love the
wild, wonderful
graphics we’ll
design for
your Web site.

Assurance

Tax

Can suiting

Customer Management
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There’s so much more to making the
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just getting a cool Web site. It’s about
combining the latest technology with
relevant, insightful business experi¬
ence. It’s about solutions that work,
not just look good.

For further information, coll:

Rand Blazer or Rod McGeary,
Vice-Chairmen,

Consulting Services,
at 1-877- AS K* KPMG

www* k pm gc on sulti ng. com

It’s time for clarity

Scrolling Past

"A museum is a repository for objects/'says artist Rebeca Bollinger, “but most
of them are never seen/ 1 As part of Museum Pieces , a self-reflective exhibit at
San Francisco's M. H. de Young Museum, Bollinger has liberated 78,000 pieces
from the digital catalogs of the de Young and the city's Palace of the Legion of
Honor. From now until March 2000, these plates will scroll across the gallery
wall as part of a loop of 10,000 glasses, coins, and other holdings. This 10- by
6-foot animated mosaic of color and shape, explains Bollinger, "is no longer
about the image, but becomes an informational pattern/'

"Once items are categorized, archived, and indexed, they Ye system ized, in a
way, to not be in front of us anymore," says Bollinger, who's spent several years
turning databases and digital catalogs into art [www.notcommon.com/rebeca).
“This piece is about forgetting." -Jennifer Hiitner

OUT

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Earthquake-damaged high-rises- Hostage situations. Leaky
plumbing. These are a few of the haunts of the Mocasin II,
a flexible, snakelike robot that can squirm its way through
pipes, moving forward and backward, up and down, and
around corners. North Carolina State University professor
Eddie Grant, whose students built the device, conceived of
the robot after talking to a US Marine who'd investigated
the searclvand-rescue operation following the Oklahoma
City bombing/'Whether you use dogs or robotics," explains
Grant,"you're looking for an information-gathering setup
to locate the survivors and survey structural damage."

The modular Mocasin can be tailored to the project: say,
equipped with a camera, sensitive microphones, infrared
sensors to detect heat, or an electronic nose to sniff out
a gas leak. Equally important, the device is pneumatic -
powered by compressed air - which means no stray sparks
could ignite flammable substances in the environment For ’Jf
disaster teams, the Mocasin is a pipe dream come true.

- Jessie Scanton

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Webhigs are like the ifgnal fires people used to
build on hilltops, passihgrh&Qews from town to
town," says Jorn Baper (front and center),an Al
software designer,who created the first weblog
(and coined the tetpi) in 1997. His Robot Vtffscton,
marks list editorialized and

eclectic mix of tech mu sings, Net culture, " ’
progressive news, and James Joyce minutiae.

This year, Barger's wisdom took to another
kind of ether - the airwaves. He contributes
material to This Is Hell!, a Saturday-morning
radio show in Chicago. Of course, Barger still
broaSct^^iai^jiii the Net, where he and his
fellow webloggers creafe+raibc^^^or
others to follow. - Michael

a sort of mega b>
arranged by dat&Ts now one of hundreds of
[such sites. Like other 'blogs, www.robotwisdom
com reflects itkauthor's obsessions, with an

Seal is thinking
that great champions
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Web surfers spend 20 percent of their

Swipe This

RETAIL Wouldn't it be great if you
could comparison shop on
the Web while you're in a store?
BarPoint.com aims to do just that,
turning barcodes into shopbots by
letting consumers pull up product
and price information from the
internet on a wireless PDA. Tapping
in the 12-digit Universal Product
Code from a retail item connects
users directly to the lowest price in
the site's 100 million-item database.
The free service launched just in
time for the holiday season, though
it remains to be seen if it can handle
the anticipated traffic crush.

BarPoint's mission is to put the
UPC to work for consumers, not just
retailers. Unlike shopping sites such
as mySimon {www,mysimonxom) r
BarPoint.com lets users compare
and save right in the store - there's
even an optional scanning gun for
discreetly swiping the UPC tag.

You may want to run that
maneuver by the security guard
first. - Adam Fisher

VOYEUR CAMS 112

MEATS PACE

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PATRICK NAUGHTON VANISHES! 11A

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Net Free for All

ACCESS 0fferin g free I n te rn et
access used to be a
go-for-broke gamble. But IstUp
.corn president and CEO Charles
Katz says thal free dialup has
quickly become a must-have fea¬
ture for Web portals. “Most major
sites ” he predicts, “will have to
offer free access in the next 12
months to stay competitive ”

Katz believes the time is right
for freeing I he Web, offering no¬
charge access in exchange, of
course, for personal information
from subscribers, who must also
put up with a permanent adver¬
tising window. (Unlike comparable
deals in the UK, Stateside free
access is truly free: There are

no local toll charges while you’re
online.) Using a similar model,
competitor NetZero snagged more
than a million users in its first
eight months - motivating the
company to file for an IPO,

Katz has positioned his firm,
recently acquired by Internet
holding company CMGI, as an
“invisible” outsource option for
established Web brands, supply¬
ing the software, dialup connec¬
tions, and targeted advertising
deals. AltaVista was the first
client to sign on with IslUp.com,
launching its Free Access service
in August. Leading teen portal
Bolt soon followed. Several large
hanks and newspapers are also

looking to pitch free access to
clients to build their own brands.

Has the free dialup access mar¬
ket, haunted by the ghosts of fail¬
ures past, been resurrected for
good? Absolutely, says Katz, point¬
ing to increased numbers of Web
advertisers and falling connectivity
costs. Plenty of users seem to think
that the price is right - AltaVista's
Free Access signed up 225,000
subscribers in just i wo weeks.

Slid, some wonder how long the
free ride can last, especially with
the growing glut of free-but-al-a-
cost computer and Internet access
offers. Even in the Net economy,
there's no such thing as a free
launch. - Evan Ratliff

D00

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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MUST READ I

time online at the top 10 sites {Media Meirix) ► Eighty-six percent of online users with TVs end Net-connected computers in the same room watch the tube and surf the Web simultaneously

Skirting the Law

SEX When the dock strikes 12
on New Year’s Eve, it will
be a misdemeanor in California to
secretly photograph up a woman's
dress or down her blouse “with
the intent to arouse, appeal to, or
gratify the lust, passions, or sexual
desires .”

But Andrew Drake, owner of
California-based Llpslurt.com, isn't

worried. Even when video voyeur¬
ism is officially against the law,
posting the images won’t be ille¬
gal. And, says Drake, news of the
law lias increased not only his
Web traffic but also the number of
“upshift” photos submitted to him.
“There are probably a dozen of
these guys doing this nonstop,"
says Drake, “and for some strange

California: down with “uppies/

reason I’ve become the high priest
of their subculture.”

The law r was prompted by sev¬
eral incidents, including one in
1998 at Disneyland: A man hiding
a camcorder in a duffel bag got
caught shooting up the dresses of
unsuspecting women. The local
district attorney, however, found
there was no law under which to
prosecute. “When I first heard
about it I wasn’t sure there w r as a
problem," says state assemblymen)-
ber Dick Ackerman, who wrote the
law. But then, he says, “l saw to or
12 Web sites that encourage it!”

Ackerman might be surprised to
learn that Drake’s site is actually
one of hundreds of like-minded
voyeur sites on the Web, and that
most of them aren’t what they
appeal' to be. “Ninety-nine percent
of what’s on the Internet is stolen
from other sites or magazines like
mine" says Dian Hanson, editor of
the adult magazine Leg Show, “We
run an upskirt photo feature every

month; it’s a very easy and cheap
thing to stage." Even Drake admits
that a majority of his upskirt pho¬
tos are faked and that the site’s
roving “V-Team” is a marketing
ploy. “We show them running
through a mall with a camera and
paintball-style outfits,” says Drake,
“so obviously it’s fiction ”

Although a video peeper could
end up in jail for up to six months
under the new law, most voyeur-
site operators say it won’t put a
dent in business, Drake, in fact,
predicts that it will encourage his
cult of photographers. “If it used
to be an adventure, now it’s more
of a dodge-and-chase” he says.

Hanson, too, is dubious. She
occasionally encounters upskirt
aficionados hiding under New
York subway stairwells and thinks
the most effective remedy is sim¬
ply to confront the voyeur. Says
Hanson: “I just tell them to go
fuck themselves.” - Adam Fisher

Suite Surrender

Back in the '60s, Palo Alto's Cabana Hotel was a Northern
California haunt of Sinatra and the Rat Pack, as well as the
place where the Beatles kicked back when they played San
Francisco. The hotel's recent $25 million makeover reflects
changing times. Though today's Chairman of the Board
probably runs a software company, she can still expect to
be pampered like a rock star: Each of the four Silicon Valley

Stress Buster Suites boasts a Jacuzzi,
massage oils, and an aromatic eye
pi How. The experience may recharge your batteries, but the
suite is anything but a network hub: The most impressive
piece of equipment is a Sharper Image Sound Soother
pumping out the serene rhythms of a babbling brook.The
hotel - just minutes from Xerox PARC - almost dares guests
to leave their laptops at home: Not only is there no in-room
broadband access, but guests are forced to fight over the
downstairs business center's lone printer. - Jennifer Hiltner
Silicon Valley Stress Buster Suite; $450 weekday, $350 weekend.

Crowne Plaza Cabana Palo Alto:+1 (650) 857 0787, Www.cruwneplazQ.tom*

IMAGES FROM TOP. JORDAN CRANE FRANCE RUFFENACH

CLOTH

N G

MUST READ

(NPD Online Research) ► Vo ice-over-IP telephony will reach 135 billion minutes of use by 2004, up from 2.7 billion today (International Data Corporation) ► Today's 5.1 million online

Patrick Doesn’t
Work Here Anymore

Patrick Natighten gats rubbed out.

Sp\U I n George Orwell’s 1984 , Winston
Smith worked for the Ministry of
Truth, excising from the public record the
names of anyone who ran afoul of Big
Brother In 1999, Smith seems to be working
at Infoseek, expunging any mention of former
executive Patrick Waugh ton from the com¬
pany's Web sites.

Not long after the FBI arrested Naughton
on September 16 for allegedly planning
a sexual encounter with a minor, Info seek
stated that Naughton no longer worked at
the company. Info seek then went to work
to make it seem as though Naughton had
never worked at the company.

Infoseek removed Naughton’s hio from
its management-team Web page and deleted
a January 28 press release detailing his
appointment as executive vice president of
products. Then Naughton’s name disappeared
from press releases on Info seek’s investor-
relations site, though his title and any state¬
ments attributed to him were left intact.

As a result, numerous releases that had
quoted him were left with awkward attribu¬
tions, such as this Naughton statement from

an August 9 press release:

" This agreement is right in line
with our partnering strategy
which is to align GO Network
with best-of-hreed partners/
said the executive vice president
of products for Infoseek.*

A sentence from a September
8 release was changed to read:
“Key team members include
Steve Wadsworth, president
of BVIG, and the executive
vice president, products, for
Infoseek” And a hastily edited
release dated June 3 attributed
a comment to "the Info seek’s
[sic] executive vice president
of products *

When Wired contacted
Intbseek about the deletions,
company spokesperson Shelly
Greenhalgh acknowledged that
Naughtcm’s bio and the release
announcing his appointment
were removed, but declined to
comment on the other revisions.

Perhaps sensing that news of the white¬
wash might prove more embarrassing than
the original problem, Infoseek went back
within 24 hours and reinserted Naughton’s
name in releases that had mentioned him.

But even that didn’t go smoothly. Although
Infoseek hills itself as one of the Web’s pre¬
mier search engines, the company failed to
locate and restore at least one former refer¬
ence to Naughton on its site. At press time,
a sentence from a July 12 release still read:
“Team members from Infoseek will include
the executive vice president, products; and
Beth Haggerty, senior vice president, advertis¬
ing sales and sponsorships*

Asked again to comment on the series of
revisions, Greenhalgh replied with a terse
email: “There is no comment on this. It was
an accident.”

In the end, the authority figure Infoseek
seems eager to please with its clumsy
rewriting effort may be Uncle Walt. Family-
oriented Disney owns 43 percent of Infoseek
and is in the process of acquiring the rest of
the company. And Big Mouse is watching.

- Andrew Marlatt

"The search for extraterrestrial life is
literally the work of centuries," says
Timothy Ferris.

Ferris has spent most of his adult life writing
about cosmology and the social implications of
life beyond Earth. He's the author of nine books,
including Coming of Age in the Milky Way, and is
a consultant to NASA on space-exploration policy.

Fifteen years after his critically acclaimed 1985
PBS special, The Creation of the Universe, Ferris'
new documentary, Life Beyond Earth (which pre¬
mieres November 10; the companion book, from
Simon & Schuster, arrives in May}, investigates
how dose we may be to a dose encounter. Ferris
explains what's behind his latest star search.

- Tom McNkhol

If you headed NASA, what would you
change?

I'd cancel the space station and start
putting that money into a mission to Mars. The
main product of the space station - at best - is
likely to be slightly better ball bearings.

But you believe there's more out there.

One thing we've learned is that life on Earth is
a whole lot more robust than we used to think.

No one has yet drilled a core sample deep enough
not to bring up microorganisms. And way up on
the upper edge of the atmosphere you also find
life-forms. So once established, life seems pretty
tenacious. The question then is, How often does it
get established? My guess is there's a lot of life out
there. Just looking at our solar system, there's a lot
of interest in Europa right now. And I think we'll
be interested in Mars for some time to come.

In life Beyond Earth,
you speculate that
alien crvltiratlons may
already be communi¬
cating vU something
you call an "interstellar
Internet." Can you
explain?

When you think about
how interstellar com¬
munication would take
place if there were
many civilizations in
the galaxy, you quickly come to the conclusion
that it makes sense to automate. You'd put a node
out on an asteroid to handle the information
traffic, and anyone on one planet who wants to
tap in only has to access that one post. It turns
communication between civilizations from a
telephone model into something more like the
Internet. The biggest gulf separating interstellar
civilizations isn't space, which is fairly easy to
bridge. It's time.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

QiQ

eoG-sLATES-i www.sJates.com

slates

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Burned out on Wall Street, Alex Bueno de Moraes
and some stockbroker friends learned the
restaurant business by waiting tables*
Now they own Manhattan hotspots
Le Zoo and Waterloo*

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DEN Father

There's no Frank Lloyd Wright of the Internet yet/' says Eddie Sotto, who aims to create virtual environments
as groundbreaking as Wright's buildings. After 13 years with Walt Disney Imagmeering, Sotto recently signed
on to revamp Digital Entertainment Network (www.den.net), a Gen V Internetwork - headed by another
Disney alum - that has filed to go public. At the Mouse House, Sotto was a creative force behind ABCs new
Times Square Studios, as well as the futuristic Encounter restaurant at LAX. Says Sotto:'’Lighting, music,
color - all these elements push buttons in people, whether it's in a theme park or on the Web." - Amy Johns

Hard Rock Cafe creator and self-
styled bodhisattva Isaac Tigrett is an
impresario for our age. So, naturally,
he's going online to "brand a lifestyle"
based on spirituality and alternative
health.

Tlgrett's 5piritChannel.com, which
debuts in mid-2000, is a kind of New
Age QVC that hawks holistic prod¬
ucts and services to everyone from
Anglicans to Zen Buddhists,"It's wide
open for people to choose and define
their own spirituality/ 1 says Tigrett,
Especially when you visualize the
prophet's Net profits* - Kristin Kimball

The Dot in .gov

Whenever government tries to regulate the Net,
the results can be ugly*That's where Elizabeth
Echols comes in.The former Morgan Stanley
investment banker was recently
appointed executive director of the
Electronic Commerce Working Group,
charged with coordinating the Clinton
administration's ecommerce policies.
Politically, Echols'job is a balancing
act, addressing consumer protection
online while keeping Clinton & Co,
on the good side of the regulation-
wary tech industry. Her message to
ecommerce companies: Police
yourselves before someone else
does*If we don't work together/
says Echo Is, "we' I J end up with state
legislation more draconian than
anything the federal government
could ever come up with/ - Brad King

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

a 20

IMAGES CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: STEPHEN STICKLER/VISAGES: ALEX TEHRAN!; GAIL ALBERT HALABAN/SABA

: pb#S .A&ESKO- H^jvMAKEUP E H IN Q A LL A G H E R / K&KO. R E PR 1 5 E NT5

the number of US households that bank online will triple to 24.2 million - Sixty percent of online users live outside the US; in three years this group will generate 64 percent of

Crack Lawyer

With federal and state legislators pushing for tougher cybercrime penalties,
criminal-defense lawyer Jennifer Granick has her hands full these days*

The San Francisco attorney focuses on defending hackers and crackers, and
her desk is cluttered with software-piracy and unauthorized-access cases. Her
major gripe, she says, is law-enforcement officials who play up the security
threat to increase their budgets and justify harsher sentences*"! would like
to see the same level of privacy and freedom online as we have in the real
world/' says Granick, So how long will she keep at it? "Until it gets fixed," she
says, "or until I get bored." - Jennifer Hillner

Management. The next big thing from Mike Wilmot

More power. More control. More headroom. The new Sal urn L-Series.

A Different Kind of Company. A Different Kind of Car,

LS. The next big thing from Saturn.

mm*

What does God’s house look like?

JVV-

awn

MUST READ

eeommerte spending International Data Corporation ► By 2002, ecommerce will save companies in industrialized nations $1.25 trillion annually in overhead such as distribution and

GON WATCH

GU1X

Pronounced “gwicks *
Derogatory tech-sup¬
port term for Unix/Linux
newbies who are used
to GUIs and don't know
their way around a
command-tine interface.

Nanohomb

A microscopic chemical
cocktail under develop¬
ment at the University
of Michigan's Center
for Biologic Nanotech¬
nology that would
destroy pathogens by
penetrating and neu¬
tralizing them. Human
trials are still years away.

Na vitoria 1

Editorial content on a
Web site that clarifies
and supports the site's
navigational structure.

Open-Publication

License

A publishing agreement
allowing artists to
release creations in any
medium into the public
domain for reproduction
and modification, while
preserving their rights to
other commercial uses.

ReVIN

To erase a stolen car's
vehicle identification
number and replace it
with a new number.

Tip o'the gambler's hat
to Joe Hobaica and
Paul McFedries.

- Gareth Branwyn
(jargon^ wired, corn)

Christmas.edu

EC DM MERGE With nearly Soul of 10 Web surfers
expected to shop online this holiday
season, etaders may have a tough time handling the hits*
But while Web merchants struggle with the predictable
traffic spikes, server crashes, and other troubling ghosts of
Christmas present, three innovative online services point
to the promise of cshopping seasons yet to come*

- Brad Wiener's

The Biggest Big Iron

SUPERCOMPUTERS ^he government may consider your Apple Power Mac G4
a supercomputer, but don't let it go to your head.To reach
the top of the latest Top 500 Supercomputers list, you'll need another 2 r QG0 G4s.

When a team from the University of Mannheim and the University of Tennessee
unveils the new list - it f $ updated every six months - at the SC99 supercomputing
conference in Portland, Oregon, nearly a third of the previous top performers will have
fallen off* The new speed champ is the revamped ASCI Blue-Pacific cluster at Lawrence
Livermore National Lab in California, Its 5,856 Motorola PowerPC 604e processors are
the same kind that powered pre-G3 Macs, but they're networked by pipes 1,500 times fatter than a T1 line.

The machine has been clocked at more than 2 trillion floating-point operations per second - 2,000 times faster
than the G4's 1 -gigaflop performance.

For consumers intent on buying a restricted supercomputer, Apple's ads are, for now, true: The G4's Velocity
Engine Motorola processor could exceed the current 2-gigaflop theoretical limit on freely exported hardware.
But within the next few months, the export bar will be raised to 6.5 gigaflops. - Paul Boutin

I hat

Tiny Bubbles Earlier this year, Amazon.com
bought San Francisco-based Alexa
Internet, a company cofounded
by Brewster Kahle that
archives the Web and gener¬
ates a text box displaying
metadata about sites.

This holiday season,

Alexa will let some of its
users beta-test Amazon,com
/.Bubbles, pop-up windows
L display data about any product
onscreen (the hard launch is slated for early 2000).
Within a zBubble are links to product reviews, sites
that offer the item at a better price, and rival products
nth ers recommen d. Th ere are al so c 1 i ckt h ro ugh s to
buy the product from Amazon, featuring the popular
1-Click option. This means that any zBubble-
enabled site essentially becomes a display window
for Amazon.

Stock Stuffers You can simultaneously shop and
move the market by joining the Online Shopping
Challenge ( wivu\ in tern etstocks.co m) , sponsored
by BancBoston Robertson Stephens* RRRS’s
resource for tech investors is
dangling the grand prize of

No Returns “More than half of gift-giving is in the presen¬
tation/ 1 says Mike Laitnon, CEO of Send.com, a gift service
for professionals looking to impress. The Waltham,
Massachusetts-based company sells exquisitely presented
bagatelles: spa treatments, fine wine, go if lessons with a
pro. With Send,com, you can even set your broker up with
a Porsche for the weekend, Vivaldi CD included. IPs the
ultimate service for those who need to “remember”
clients. And for those just getting the hang
of this internet thing, a gift from
Send.com makes newbies appear Net
savvy, Send.com already has compe¬
tition: A company called Camdens
(www.camdens.com) lets recipients
choose from a preset array of gifts,
though the all-important presenta¬
tion lacks Send.corn's flourish.

a $10,000 online shop¬
ping spree in front of
users willing to pro¬
vide feedback on the
etailers they frequent:

Did the package arrive
in time? And - to see
whether a merchant is
actually using the Net for
target marketing - did you receive
offers tailored to your interests?

The survey’s weekly results will be made available to
investors, who may decide to buy or sell shares of a com
pany based on the information,

“It’s the same thing I used to do when Pd go into five
malls in two hours” says RRBS senior etailing analyst
Lauren Cooks Levitan, who cooked up the Challenge.
“We expect the results to move slocks”

WIRED DECEMBER 1 99 9

□ 2Q

alta vis,a: SEARCH

Search j Live | Shopping | Local | Free Access

• We've been the Internet’s best place to
ask questions (ethereal and otherwise)
since 1995, when we were its first and only
search engine.

Today, we're even more helpful.

First, with an index that covers over 90
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MUST READ

order handling (Gig* Information Group! ► Twenty-nine percent of female Internet users plan to shop online during this holiday season, six times as many as in the same period last year

This Nose Knows

The wand serves as
a nostril: Push a button,
and Cyranose sniffs.

The pneumatic pump

inhales the sample through
the sensor module and
exhales it through the
exhaust outlet.

"► Background odor is sampled
through a separate Inlet so it
can be factored out of the
sample sniff,

^ The actual smelling Is done by
a ceramic chip containing 32 sensor
elements. Each is made from a
different polymer composite, a type
of conductive plastic that expands in
the presence of a specific chemical
vapor. Expansion increases the
sensor's electrical resistance.

UNDER THE HOOD Lots of companies are sniffing after the future, but Pasadena, California-based
B Y DAVID P E S C 0 VI F Z Cyrano Sciences ( www.cyranosciences.com ) is putting its money where its nose

is. The Cyranose 520, a $10,000 handheld electronic odor detector, can digitally
analyze and identify a wide range of smells - all within 10 seconds. Commercial applications include
catching spoilage at food plants, detecting hazardous chemicals in the air and water, testing perfumes for
quality, and diagnosing certain odorific diseases in patients - diabetes or lung cancer, for instance.

The Cyranose is essentially a reverse-engineered human nose. 'Though the device has only 52 olfactory
sensor elements (compared with the thousands of receptor cells in the real thing), for many odors the
machine rivals the best-trained flesh-and-blood snout. The manufacturer’s three-year goal: to shrink the
Cyranose onto a “Nose-Chip” cheap enough to embed in smoke detectors or, say, pots and pans to sniff out
contamination, Here’s a look up the electronic schnozz.

* There's 256K of RAM under the pneumatic
manifold, the vapor pipes that route the smell.
Dynamic R AM serves as the computation memory
for the microprocessor; flash RAM holds a library
of several hundred reference smells. When an odor
signature matches a reference smell, Cyranose's
LCD screen lights up and identifies it by name.

The analog output emits voltage
levels that correspond to what
Cyranose smells,This Interface can
control mechanical devices like those
typically used at a production plant.

The analog input, essentially
a remote-control jack, can be used
to synchronize the device with other
sampling systems.

The digital I/O
ports. R5232 and USB
connectors, can link
with a PC host program
to configure the device,
graphically display
analyses, and query
a remote library of
catalogued smells.

-► The 32-bit Hitachi SH4 microprocessor

brain runs Cyrano Sciences' proprietary
software, which analyzes the pattern of
resistance across the 32-sensor array to
generate a distinct "odor signature/

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

□ 20

IMAGE: KIM KULISH/5ABA

,003

Fines

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Dewar’s, profile

Adam Sherman, Bryce Roberts & Niki Slnglaub
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They're fighting an uphill battle * They knew they’d face

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Jackson Hole factory, they're finally breaking even. But for them, success is secondary,
They're in it for the sport. , _

They re Dewars.

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• Ksi • intcrjctiv*.’} ► The Web shopping boom will increase demand for warehouse space by 60 million square feet to 100 million over the next three years 4

Mir Beer /

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Saving Mir

After 14 years of service, the pioneering Mir space station is slated for

___destruction because the cash-strapped Russian space agency can't

afford to maintain ft. Russian ground controllers plan to nudge the 140-ton station out
of orbit in February, sending it earthward to burn up in the atmosphere. But it J s not too
late for a miracle. With a little capitalist know-how, Mir can easily be repositioned as a
commercial venture, providing decades of service and sky-high revenues. - Tom McNichol

Sailing Through Space

EXPLORATION Sails ma Y be a trailing-edge
technology on Earth, but
they could be headed for a heyday In space. Uni¬
versity of Washington scientists are developing
a propulsion system that uses a type of solar sail
to push spacecraft at speeds up to 180,000 mph -
10 times faster than a space shuttle. The sail
is actually an invisible electromagnetic field
that catches solar wind, the continuous blast of
charged particles emitted by the sun. Geophysi¬

cist Robert Winglee and his colleagues have built
a prototype of the sail, which they've dubbed
M2P2 (for Mini Magnetosphere Plasma Propul¬
sion). The team hopes to have a mode) ready to
show NASA within two years* M2P2 would let
spacecraft catch free rides on the solar breezes,
making interplanetary space probes and piloted
missions faster and cheaper. Says Winglee,"If
it works - and that's a big if - it could provide
ready access to all the planets." - Carl Zimmer

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

IMAGE: TIM KLJCYNDA

John Christakos

president Blu Dot design

creates his own furniture

builds his own business trips

fctorllxwiq AnVkJi, Inc.

n w a * c o m

buy tickets

check departures

upgrade seats

run company

Northwest Airlines

Thomas Jeffers
3 hours a night.

► You are not Tho

on slept

mas Jefferson.

Click Here For | Small Business Advice | Business Products | Business Services | Your Sanity

When @Home unveiled its plan for
broadband cable modem service
in 1995, residential Netheads
salivated at the thought of 10-Mbps
connections. But the cablecos have
been relatively slow to retrofit their
networks for two-way data capacity.
Meanwhile, the phone companies'
digital subscriber line technology -
catapulted by a 300 percent jump
in new users for the first half of 1999
- is on the fast track and should top
a million users sometime next year.
At a top speed of 1.5 Mbps for a
typical connection, DSL clearly lags
behind cable's promise. Yet today's
consumers are readily ''settling"
for DSL, which maxes out unused
bandwidth in copper
already in the ground and 3,6]
leapfrogs the long wait for ~ L
a coax upgrade.

■ k - 1 • - )m Pi* ' •- 1 •. m

Marketers cite a "share of mind"
value when calculating brand
awareness. For the most popular
brands-the McGIobalizing
juggernauts like Coca-Cola,
Disney, and, of course, Mickey
Q's ’the number approaches
100 percent in the US. That's
no surprise, since most of these
megabrands have been part
of Americana for decades.

But in the last few years, Web
commerce companies have
done an astounding job of
carving out mindshare. A recent
Opinion Research survey shows
that Amazon and Priceline
- both less than five years old -
already ring a bell in the heads
of more than 100 million
Americans, proving that when
it comes to way-new branding,
dot-coms are the real thing.

Source:

Opinion Research Corporation International
E www. op ini a n research .com ).

•- A r fiK

TECHNOLOGY

ELECTRONICS

DEVELOPING COMMUNICATIONS
COMPUTERS

SOFTWARE AND COMPUTER SERVICES
BUSINESS SERVICES AND OUTSOURCING

102 - 34 %

119 , 01 %

96 , 48 %

72 , 80 %

46 . 02 %

31 . 91 %

35 . 72 %

42 , 81 %

28 . 13 %

38 . 58 %

30 . 64 %

TFTS VEAR/LIII

28 . 43 %

32 . 11 %

2 5 . 50 %"
29 . 86 %
25 , 87 %
23 , 82 %’

Returns ofW3Q/99? Past pertoimmce is no guarantee of future results

Fidelity 1

I Investments '■

WE HELP YOU INVEST RESPONSIBLY*

It’s ime some technology stocks have been big winners, but
others have declined sharply. I f you believe in the opportunities
presumed by technology companies, let Fidelity expertise ,
help guide you. There are six different Fidelity Select funds
that invest in companies that are principally engaged in or
benefit from technological advances. Only you can decide
which funds are right for your portfolio, but see what
Fidelity money management excellence can do for you.

FOR THE FIDELITY SELECT TECHNOLOGY PORTFOLIO FACT KIT visit FIDELITY.COM or

Ms. Stein is a Fidelity customer and was compensated.

Fur mote complete information on any Fidelity fund, call for a ifcee prospectus and read lL carefully, before investing,

TDD SERVICE: 1-800-544-0118 for the deaf and hearing-impaired 9 am - 9 pin, ET

Life of fund is ton inception, date; 6/29/90 for De ve lopi ng Communica lions and 2/4/98 for Business Set vices and Outsourcing. : Average annual total returns include changes in share price, reinvestment
or dividends and capital gains, and each funds 3.00% sales diarge. Share price and return will vary and you may have a gain or loss when you sell your shams. Because of their narrow foots, Sector
funds may be more volatile than funds that diversify across many sectors. All Select equity portfolios have a 57 50 exchange fee and a 0.75% short-term trading fee on shares held 29 days or less. On
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KERAGES d ^LLAR

The raging bull market has brought britk-and-mortar financial consultants
a significant rise in profits as more US personal savings migrate into
securities, boosting total assets by 33 percent to $12 trillion thisyear,from
$9 trillion in 1997. But figures for the online brokerage houses like E*Trade
are shooting up even faster* By 2003, ebrokerages will hold $3 trillion In
assets - quadruple 1999's totals - with 20 million US households trading
online, up from 4 million today*

Sources:

Jupiter Communications (im4v.Juj7.C4m);
Paine Webber {www^pulnc wetbecetf m];
Spectre m Group (bvi^jpecJ re/nxom).

FIND OUT ABOUT THE GADGET YOU
DIDN'T REALIZE YOU WANTED YET.

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Technology that’s
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Choose o

digital camera

Digital p

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Che

digital

t about

cameras

Sojar-powered
T-shirts by D ei Sot

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Show me how I cart

Top 10 gadget*
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Full speed ahead
with car gadgets

TV shows
0earned to cars-

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Shop for
Webcams

Find your
perfect PC

11/000 and
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MP3 must-haves

accessorize with
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Cell phones for the
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Global Positioning
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Qualcomm Q Phone:
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buyers guide
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m ^ '93 CHET Tech

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16 vacation-time
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Sony closing wireless
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Handheld games

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it J $ a flat world,
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CNET.com

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REVIEWS I PRODUCT COMPARISON

PRICES I NEWS I TECH AUCTIONS I WEB BU

NG l DOWNLOADS I HELP t AND MOR

While startup jocks may slog away well past the 5 p.m.
whistle, most Americans still clock in close to the
standard 40 hours. (In fact, the average workweek from
sea to shining sea hasn't changed much since 1990.) Not
true of the rest of the industrialized world, where R&R
takes up a considerably larger portion of the calendar.
Despite all the prod activity-enhancing wonders of our
Silicon Valley-centric age, Europe seems to have seized
the high ground for the smart-and-lazy future.

Sources;

Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development [www.oec&Qrgk
UBS (mrno6s.com).

Combined 97-'98 figures.
h Some totals from representative city figure.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

TO 00!

Framr * ftifruE,
5tmtt|

Citjrt _______

St«etv

Cltyl

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Fidelity

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best financial, news, reference, entertainment, and travel sites on the Web. In fact

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Palm Computing, Inc., developeV pfftie world’s leading handheld platform.

£1990 3Com Corporation. 3Com the 3Com logo, and Patm Compiling are registered in* mart* m* Palm, Palm Vil, P.ilw Hr. the Pafm
Com^iiiing Platform logo, Simply Palm, and Mora oomwciud, am trademarks of Palm Computing. Inc or .3Com Corporation fill rights reserved,

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Got Risk?

Talk to Clay Struve, quant savant. He's the guy that big money banks on.
By Edward Cone

I t’s the day before Black Monday, 1Q87, and like the rest
of the world Clay Struve has no idea that tomorrow
the Dow will have its worst day ever. Yet he is uneasy
enough with the “weirdness in the air* that he goes into
work on a Sunday afternoon.

In the office, he and his team race to recalculate the
risk scenarios by which O'Connor & Associates, the secre¬
tive Chicago options-trading firm where he is a 28-year-
old partner, manages its portfolio. When the software
guys get stuck, it’s Struve, a nonprogrammer, who intu¬
its the fix by analyzing the batch of data causing the

Struve, a legend
in the world of risk
management in his
Chicago offices.

problems and then steering a
solution. By the next morning
- before the market accelerates
into a 23 percent free fall -
Struve's team has mapped, and begins executing,
a strategy to survive a 24 percent plunge.

O'Connor still takes a big hit, giving up its gains for
what had been a very good year, but it actually makes
money on the option portfolio Struve modeled. The firm,
a market maker that trades options amounting to almost
5 percent of the daily volume on the New York Stock

WIRED DECEMBER 1959

D40

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expedition

Exchange, endures a Darwinian moment and
lives lo trade another day. “We got killed on
our risk-arbitrage positions, but the system
held up fine, 15 Struve reflects. “Our winners
helped us lose a half-ton instead of a ton

It would not be entirely accurate to say
that Struve (rhymes with groovy) made his
reputation as a risk manager that Monday,
in that he was already known as a boy
genius within O'Connor and has remained
largely unknown to the rest of the world
since. People in Struve's line of work don't
really want to be widely known anyway,
since they usually make the news only
when they lose several billion dollars, like
the lauded economists who launched last
year's hedge fund Hindenburg, Long-Term
Capital Management, But at a time when
every trading firm has its guru - the quan¬
titative whiz whose ideas feed the computers
- Few, if any, can match Struve's record for
designing risk-management systems that
don't blow up. And as his ideas seep into the
mainstream, he could yet make the world
safe for financial engineering.

For the uninitiated, an option is the right
{but not the obligation) to buy or sell a secu¬
rity at a given price before a certain date.
Options traders place huge bets on the
smallest of movements, it's a high-stakes
game where one's ability to accurately cal¬
culate price is everything.

Options pricing was revolutionized by the
Black-Scholes model, published in 1973 by
then-MIT professor Myron Scholes and con¬
sultant (and MIT professor-to-be) Fischer
Black. It's a complex equation that includes
sensitivity of the option's value to such factors
as changes in price (delta), the rate of change
of the delta (gamma), changes in time (theta),
and volatility (vega). The formula earned
Scholes a Nobel in economic sciences (Black
died before the prize was awarded). But
Struve feels it's not comprehensive enough.

The Struve way is not a formula - though
it starts with some fancy math - and it's
more than the sum of the processing power
and 3-D graphics used to enable it. He starts
with Black-Scholes and returns frequently to
a chart showing the relative rale of return
of stocks and bonds over the last four
decades, using tools as mundane as Value
Line sheets and press releases to flesh out
the numerical picture. Al the methodology's
core is an understanding of the ways markets

tend toward improbable disasters, impelled
by the self-referential behavior of investors.

Financial engineers have a history of mis¬
taking markets for a rational universe, of
looking past the tiny odds of a given cata¬
clysm to the huge streams of cash their
models will more likely produce, but Struve
seems immune to modelitis. He reads every¬
thing, and uses his prodigious knowledge
of market history to contextualize the data
points on the charts inside his head, sensing
the gravitational tug of divergent possibili¬
ties, understanding each outlier on the graph
as a warning beacon ora killer opportunity.

Struve loves the point of change - such
as a takeover or a merger - when stocks
tend to move, because il can bring mispric¬
ing. He doesn't mind trading in boring old
companies like the maker of Morton Salt,
and even before this summer's deflation
he scoffed at Internet hottics like eBay (he
calls it “SanfQrdandSon.com*) as faddish.

The man admits his methodology is cau¬
tious - a quality not associated with tura-of-
the-miflennium markets. But as 1999 draws
to a close, Struve says he’s ahead of his goal
of 20 percent annual returns. (“Thai's War¬
ren Buffett territory” he says. “I'll take it”)
And he prescribes his risk-avoiding meth¬

mustachioed Bears fanatic than it might be
for another math genius. But he doesn't have
a job equal to his abilities.

“I could have been the cure for Long-Term
Capital," he says, without bravado, of the
heavily leveraged hedge fund that had to
be rescued by the Federal Reserve with a
midtibillion-dollar capital infusion. “I'd have
thought about helping them If they called."

But the telephone isn't ringing - leaving
Clay Struve, for the moment, a vastly under¬
valued asset.

O ne of the first limes I meet Struve is on
a cool Chicago day, and although he's
wearing one of his usual off-brand golf shirts,
he chooses an outdoor table at a lestauranl
near the Chicago Board of Trade. The sun
has passed behind the top of the western
wall of this little urban canyon, but Struve
figures that within five minutes its reflected
rays will angle off the glass face of the oppos¬
ing wall to warm us up. lie orders a grilled
ham-and-American-cheese, fries, and a short
Killian's, and sits back to wail for the sun.

We freeze. “The angle was right, but there
wasn't enough heat in the reflection for such
a windy day," shrugs Struve. This is how he
perceives the world, as a series of relation¬

Struve loves takeovers and mergers - points of
change when mispricing often occurs.

ods now especially, “There are places like
mortgage-backed securities where people
are less prepared than they think,” he says.
“A lot of the risk-control methods in use are
reasonable for reasonable times, bul not in
crazy times, and most of the people trading
today have never seen a real bad time.”

And yet despite his intricate knowledge
of the markets, the next crisis - wherever
it strikes - will most likely unfold without
significant direct input from Clay Struve.
These days he trades for CSS, a small firm
he set up with a few other O'Connor alums,
on the 15th floor of a worn-out budding on
La Salle Street in Chicago's financial district.
He's got a glassed-in office, complete with
family phoLos, a copy of one of his favorite
books (The Visual Display of Quantitative
Information), and one of those dummied-up
magazine covers showing him as a football
star, which is less of a stretch for the burly,

ships and variables and angles to be charted
and bet on. This innate view of the world
has been with him since boyhood - his
father, Ted, a retired corporate exec with
a PhD in operations research, had Clay
working algebra problems before kinder¬
garten. (“Nothing too hard - just solving for
an unknown, understanding relationships”
says the elder Struve.) As a sports-crazy
kid, Clay was fascinated by figuring out all
the obscure things lhal can possibly happen
within the rules of baseball or football, how¬
ever unlikely or bizarre.

Years later, armed with an 800 on his malh
SAT and several charts comparing the relative
merits of different colleges, Struve landed at
MIT, where he became both a hard-partying
Midwestern guy - a frat-house legend and
barroom fixture who attended classes on his
own schedule - and a scholar of finance
who worked with and studied under Fischer

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Black before graduating in five semesters.

At MIT, he picked up a discipline that
would underpin his risk-management
methodology. “I learned from Fischer Black
that when you try to sort out the effect of
something, you can take it to the extreme
and use the extreme to help identify the
effects on a small scale,” he says, uttering
one of his longest sentences of the day
Upon graduation, Struve took up rugby.

On a playing trip to Ireland, he met his future
wife, Donna, to whom he proposed with
a quantitative discussion of the advantages
of the US over Ireland. Married for 15 years,
they are intent on raising their children with
a minimum of what Struve calls “jet-set BS ”
They Live with two golden retrievers and
a Jack Russell terrier named Elmo in a hand¬
some but hardly palatial house, not far from
Struve’s boyhood home in Evanston,

S truve arrived at O’Connor & Associates
in June 1977, at a pivotal moment in
financial history. The science of pricing
options had been greatly advanced by the
Black-Scholes model, but the real-world road
testing was being done by firms like O’Con¬
nor. “O’Connor stood out - it was an in nova-
tor,” says Scholes, who after winning the
Nobel Prize went on Lo become one of the
failed wise men at Long-Term Capital, “Its
use of options and of options-pricing tech¬
nology showed it really understood the busi¬
ness, especially risk and risk management”
While it may be grandiose to assign any
one person credit for developing the risk-
management methodology at O’Connor, a
powerful but virtually anonymous firm that
helped create the modern options business,
the firm’s members acknowledge Struve as
the master in an abstruse field. “His work
was known as avant-garde ” says Scholes,
now a professor emeritus at Stanford.

“The rule was that if Clay said OK, you
could do it, and if Clay said no, you couldn’t
do it. Virtually the entire theory underlying
O’Connor’s success was invented by Clay”
adds Bob Gumerlock, a former O’Connor
partner who became the ranking risk-man¬
agement executive at Swiss Bank Corpora¬
tion after it acquired the Chicago firm. “The
theoiy belongs to Black and Scholes first, but
Struve and O’Connor founder Mike Green-
baum made the option model fly and not
crash. He never succumbed to the academic

hubris thal gets other people into trouble ”

Id the early ’80s, Greeubaum and his pro-
tege, Struve, agreed that dynamic liedging
techniques were needed to manage portfolios
against ordinary market moves as weLl as the
possibility of shocks. Rather than risking
their money on static assumptions, they used
those assumptions as a base to continuously
uncover the ever changing events that could
lead to catastrophe and set up constraints to
keep the firm from being exposed to them.

The practical result of Struve's insight has
been the technique of constantly stress test¬
ing and adjusting portfolios to keep them
away from black holes, mapping positions
against a broader historical background than
that used at many trading houses. Struve's
philosophy is basically that complacency
is full of shit.

Of course, not everyone subscribes. Struve
scorns the softness of big Wall Street compa¬
nies that gamble with other people’s money
and lack the discipline to consistently man¬
age risk.

Driving a big options book of thousands
of positions is a computationally intensive
endeavor, and O'Connor was always a tech¬
nological trailb Inzer, an early user of Sun
workstations and later one of the few cus¬
tomers of Steve Jobs' career intermezzo,
NeXT Software. “We would shred the com¬
puter boxes so people wouldn't know what
we were doing, because we had stuff that
nobody else had," says Craig Heim ark, head
of technology at O'Connor, and later at Swiss
Bank. “We were into symbolics and AL Our
visualization tools [developed in-house] are
still better than most of whafs out there.”

O'Connor was also an early backer of
the Prediction Company, the Santa Fe, New
Mexico-based firm founded by physicists
Doyne Farmer and Norman Packard to cre¬
ate trading software; Struve is still a com¬
pany director. The Prediction Company uses
what is now commonly referred to as “the
black box" to look for pricing anomalies and
figure risk-adjusted positions. The box
sweeps back and forth like a robot to keep
things neat and tidy. Trading this way is not
Struve's thing, though. “No fun," he grunts.

While technology was a key to the com¬
pany's strategy, O’Connor prospered by inte¬
grating the computers and the math into a
superior process - the Struve way, the sum
of his perception and knowledge and his

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toolkit. “A lot of the geeks in QR are pretty
good at dueling models ” says Heimark, “and
Clay understands the details of the models
as well as any PhD who builds them, but
he is exceptional at understanding bow to
apply them in a practical environment. lie
has an innate sense.”

Tom Sparks, a former O’Connor colleague
who now runs a small trading shop of his
own, says Struve stands nut in this scientific
field because he brings a touch of art to the
equation - an ability he gleaned from his
mother, Gail, who is an artist: T think he
got a little of that, and he is able to apply
it to financial math ”

Struve’s sense gives him the confidence
to disbelieve his own model, or to start the
engines on big trades when he believes the
numbers speak the truth. He loves the his¬
torical anomaly, the stuff outside the mod¬
els. When, early in his career, Continental
Illinois melted down, he decoded the Fed’s
deiphie utterings through a careful reading
of central-bank phraseology and then con¬
vinced his partners to make a huge bet thal
the preferred shares alone would be res¬
cued, O’Connor bought as much of the pre¬
ferred as it could without having to file with
the SEC and ended up with a 200 percent
return on its investment over a year. ‘That
was seeing something that was either priced
really low or really high and figuring out
which it was,” says Struve.

By the late ’80s, O’Connor was looking for
a deep-pocketed partner to pursue larger and
more diverse positions around the globe. The
partners entered a currency venture with
Swiss Bank in 1989, which proved to be the
first step toward a full sellout in 1994. Soon
thereafter, the culture Struve loved began to
change. While O’Connor was a tight frater¬
nity - almost literally for Struve, given the
20-odd MIT Lambda Chis who came through
the place over the years - Swiss Bank was
large and political. Struve struggled. His
friend Heimark says Struve’s “absurdly high”
standards are impossible to maintain at an
institution of the scale brought about by the
merger. He’s not a prima donna - he just
won’t play politics,

“If he knows he’s intellectually right, he
doesn’t need to be seen as correct by any¬
one else in the room” says Gumerlock. “He
needs a political sponsor ~ not just for the
communication skills but to handle the

bullshit of a big organization.” Sick of trav¬
eling to Switzerland to watch his ideas get
bogged down in bureaucracy, Struve left
Swiss Bank in October 1997. Tan months
later, he and his partners opened CSS.

S truve siis before two monitors in the CSS
office, one a Bloomberg terminal and the
other a PC with ail Excel screen that displays
the graphs on stocks he’s tracking. The graphs
plot price, time, volatility, and other variables
in complex patterns of colored lines that look
like a failed Mondrian but speak to Struve in
his native tongue. Using charts and his brain,
drinking Diet Cokes, and talking softly to
Mike Fitzgibhons, another O’Connor vet who
works the phones and places the trades,

before being swallowed by one of the world’s
largest banks, Union Bank of Switzerland,
in 1998. Shortly thereafter, UBS was rocked
by losses of almost 1 billion Swiss francs in
the Long-Term Capital fiasco. Wham. The
UBS risk team got canned, and suddenly
O’Connor vets were running the show at
ground zero of the hedge fund disaster.

Other institutions are also moving toward
the Struve way, testing for exposure to
shocks several decimal points beyond the
seven-sigma probability Gumerlock and
others attach to the Long-Term implosion.
Big banks like .1, P. Morgan & Co,, which
publicly dissed stress testing in the mid-’90s,
now fill annual reports with paeans to the
technique. The Basel Committee on Banking

Big banks like J. P. Morgan once publicly dissed
stress testing.Today, they fill their annual
reports with paeans to Struve's techniques.

Struve can price options on a single stock
as welt as anybody in the world. Without
the computational muscle he left behind at
Swiss Bank, though, he can’t begin to man¬
age a large portfolio.

CSS is capitalized with about $20 million
from the partners and a handful of investors,
and recently added index trading to its equi¬
ties business. Still, for a year-old firm that
commands so much intellectual firepower,
the place feels sleepy. Some of that is due
to the professionalism of its people, but you
can’t escape the feeling that the 41-year-old
Struve is at an intermezzo of his own, facing
the existential dilemma: What next?

Certainly Struve is happier than he was at
Swiss Bank. He’s working with guys he likes,
Chicago guys like Fitz and fast-talking Mickey
Carusiilo (the C in CSS), enjoying an oilcan
of Fosters on the early train hack to the sub¬
urbs, coaching his son and daughter in youth
sports. He has time to ski. Maybe he’s eas¬
ing into something big (“WeTe only about
hip-deep so far” he says), and he’ll end up
rebuilding and advancing the systems he left
behind at the bank, Carusiilo sure hopes so.

T can build a business around Clay,” he says.
“We’re going to make a lot of money at this.”

Meanwhile, Struve’s disciples have been
busy replicating his meme. Swiss Bank
adopted the Chicago risk-management system

Supervision, an international financial -
standards group, is reviewing changing its
risk-control recommendations to a continu¬
ous-assessment model based on historical
data instead of one-day numbers. And ear¬
lier this year, Alan Greenspan emphasized
the need for stress testing and risk mitiga¬
tion based on searching out and identifying
tiny possibilities of catastrophe. “The Struve
way is now state religion,” says Gumerlock.

But there are still many unbelievers and
unenlightened souls, too many market shocks
waiting to happen. The question of how to
value short options granted by companies to
employees demands an intellectually rigor¬
ous answer, and Greenspan has testified to
Congress about “the technologically driven
proliferation of new financial instruments”
that lack comprehensive risk control. Experts
can’t even agree on how to read the metrics
by which the stock market values companies.
And there’s always the prospect of a variable
that’s not even on the radar. Tet wherever it
comes from, disaster will strike.

Meanwhile, Struve, arguably the world’s
best risk manager, sits on the bench while
the scrubs play the game. That is, to be sure,
a poor way of managing risk. ■ ■ ■

Edward Cone {efcone@mindsprmg.com)
is a senior writerfor Inter@ctive Week.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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Code Warrior

Microsoft's head honcho for Windows 2000 seeks perfection.
It's a lonely crusade. By Chip Bayers

B efore the lights go out, before the money suddenly
disappears from your bank accounts, before planes
fall from the sky, before Y2R rears its ugly head, Micro¬
soft will bring Windows 2000 to market Honest, After
years of missed launch dates and broken promises,
recrafted strategies and skirted deadlines, the next
great leap in Microsoft operating-system technology
is at hand. As of September, company spukespeople
and executives were saying (strictly on the QT, of
course) that W2K would ship before December 31.

Now for the real news: The release will come not so
much with fist-pumping enthusiasm as with a tremen¬
dous sigh of relief from Jim Allchin, the Microsoft
senior VP who has been the biggest champion of the
Windows franchise in recent years.

The market first expected this major upgrade to the
Windows NT OS back in 1995. Five years Later, you'd
think Microsoft would have ironed out the product.

Only weeks before the
promised launch of
W2K, Microsoft senior
VP itm Allchin still had
plenty of bugs to kill.

And yet, by the start of the fourth
quarter, the launch date remained
uncertain because W2K still had
bugs. Which is actually no great
surprise. Any complex software
the size of Windows 2000 - there are 29 million lines of
code in the client version alone - will have bugs. But
Alichin says many of the bugs, and the resulting delays,
were caused by a “sloppiness* that has forced a reassess¬
ment of the development process.

“When you're moving so fast, it's easy to Jet leakages
happen,* says the 48-year-old commander of the con¬
sumer and enterprise versions of Windows as well as
the streaming-media group. “You’re driving the team:
‘Make progress in this particular area.’ And they’re say¬
ing, £ I don’t quite have the interface I need on this other'
piece.’ We’re driving ’em, so they change it.” But over¬
lapping changes cause cascading errors, better known

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as bugs* “And il can be quite depressing”
says All chin, “with so many bugs that every¬
body knows exist ”

Windows 2000 (renamed last fall from
NT 5,0) was originally intended to be much
more than an upgrade: It was supposed to
unify the corporate OS - Windows NT -
with the consumer OS - Windows 9x, At
last, the DOS technology underlying the
consumer operating system would give
way to the more stable NT kernel. While
the unification would go unnoticed by most
users, it was meant to be a show of faith to
developers. No longer would they need to
write separate code for consumer and cor-
porate software.

Alas, W2K won't meet that promise. Ear¬
lier this year, Microsoft admitted that the
common code base is still years off. Even
the DOS-based next-generation consumer
OS - codenamcd Millennium - has been
pushed back to 2001 Don't expect Neptune,
a consumer OS based on NT, until at least a
year later. (Millennium and Neptune are
on parallel tracks within Allchin's groups.)

By now, of course, missed ship dates and
buggy releases have become the MO at
Microsoft. Analysts, beta users, and the
media seem to have built delays and bugs
into their expectations. Reviews suggest
that W2K combines the stability of NT with
the best of Windows 98 - power manage¬
ment, for instance. As a result, the product
should do well at market, international Data
Corporation projects Microsoft's share of
server units sold worldwide to increase from
38 percent in 1998 to as much as 44 percent
in 2003 - thanks in large part to W2K,

Beyond the numbers, though, is a meta-
story. It ends with the realization that,
despite the sell-through projections. Allchin
- a nine-year veteran of Microsoft and an
indefatigable perfectionist - felt short
of his goal. But the most interesting part
of the story, as usual, is what happened
along the way.

A llchin never sought the spotlight. He
was nonetheless thrust into it last win¬
ter as part of Microsoft’s botched attempt,
during its antitrust trial, to discredit a gov¬
ernment witness with an amateurishly doc¬
tored video. The incident made international
news and undermined the software giant’s
already battered image. In the process.

Allchin - a man praised by colleagues and
peers for his intense pride and integrity -
was sideswiped.

At the trial, government witness Edward
Felten, a Princeton University computer sci¬
ence professor, claimed to have written a
program that could, contrary to Microsoft's
claims, uninstall the Internet Explorer
browser without adversely affecting the OS.
To refute Felten’s point, Microsoft attorneys
and marketers pushed forth AJlchin, accom¬
panied by a video demonstrating that Felten’s
uninstall did indeed hurt the performance
of a computer running Windows.

While Microsoft's claim may have techni¬
cally been true, the video was a fake. As gov¬
ernment attorneys quickly pointed out, the
tape had been cobbled together' from footage
of several different machines. Gates called
the incident an embarrassment. No one was
more humiliated than Allchin,

Months later, when I asked him in an
email to explain what happened, Allchin
dismissed the ordeal ~ in nine passionate,
lengthy paragraphs. “I had people come to
my office and basically break down, saying
it killed them to know my integrity was
questioned because of [their] mistake,” he
wrote. “Personally, I let this go a long time
ago. People were trying to save me time, in
retrospect, 1 should have done it myself. The

Now, with W2K poised to launch, Allchin
confronts a world in which Windows is
waning as a power - even, if you consider a
September meeting held in San Francisco to
tout the company’s cross-platform ambitions,
within Microsoft itself.

Given Allchin’s personal history, this is
an almost poignant twist of fate. The world
of the Internet, where millions of people
share resources across a decentralized web
of computers, is a world Allchin envisioned
as a doctoral student at the Georgia Institute
of Technology in the early 1980s. At a time
when freestanding minicomputers like Digi¬
tal’s VAX machines dominated college cam¬
puses, Georgia Tech faculty, with Allchin’s
help, were developing an experimental com¬
puting environment called Clouds, Allchin's
PhD thesis laid out au architecture for Clouds
that would let computers share resources.
Indeed, it was a preview of distributed com¬
puting - where the Net itself becomes one
big computer - as envisioned today in such
software products as Sun’s Jini.

Allchin went on from Georgia Tech to
help design the Vines networking software
at Banyan Systems, which, at the time, was
Lhe PC networking leader. When Microsoft
executives first approached Allchin about a
job in 1989, he wasn’t interested - frankly,
he thought Microsoft’s products sucked. The

Jim Allchin is "a brilliant technologist, visionary,
and a strong leader," says Bill Gates.

sad thing is that this is such a small point:
an interesting news paper/dinner topic, but
not the point at all.

“The question” he continued, “is whether
we did something good for consumers and
whether our innovation of integration offered
compelling value. Innovation to win cus¬
tomers is w hat business is all about. We
innovated through unifying the browsing
experience for local files, server files, and
Internet files. I stand by this.”

Aside from hurting his reputation, the
tidal distracted Allchin from his long struggle
to shepherd W2K to market and, in a larger
sense, protect the Windows flagship inside
Microsoft. To those ends, Rill Gates and
Microsoft president Steve Ballmer earlier this
year handed Allchin command of both the
consumer and business divisions of Microsoft.

company’s reputation, he says in the soft
twang of a transplanted Southerner, “was
truly - and this is just my opinion - truly
quite bad. Microsoft was not known as a
company that built quality software.

“I kidded them, saying, ‘You brought us
DOS and then you followed it up with OS/2 -
both of which 1 don’t have much respect for,’ ”
Allchin remembers. “At Banyan, we tried
to use OS/2, It was just so bad! It wouldn’t
print. It was just not architected right at all,”

Obsessed with Novell’s competitive threat,
Microsoft considered Allchin a key to the
future of its networking-software strategy. The
company courted him intensely for nearly a
year, in an effort that included the ministra¬
tions of both Ballmer and Gates, We’re really
serious about mending our ways, the Micro-
softies insisted. In the end, they bagged their

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| Expanding Possibilities

man with a dare. What bigger challenge
could there be for a programmer than mak¬
ing Microsoft software work? “Bill said, ‘No
matter how good your software is someplace
else, you can probably touch more people
by coining here. We’ll give you the resources,
and well build it here/” Allchin recalls,
‘‘Maybe Vm sappy, but that got me,”

O nce inside. Allchin aligned himself
with Windows, In his first six months,
fresh with his new religion, he convinced
management to dismantle the 350-person
programming group responsible for devel¬
oping networking software based on OS/2,
the operating system developed jointly by
Microsoft and IBM that was supposed to
succeed DOS. “1 know I probably upset a
few people during and after that/' lie says.

He worked slowly to grow networking
muscle inside Windows NT, Microsoft’s then-
nascent server technology. With the release
of NT 4.0 in 1996 - six years after AJlchin
came on board - Microsoft introduced a
solid competitor to Novell’s NetWare.

In the beginning, Allchin held on to his
dream of distributed computing, which even¬

tually evolved into the Cairo project - a pre-
Web attempt to build a brand-new OS that
would include new ways of browsing for
information across platforms. took a team,
and we tried to lay out a future vision for
what could be done with deeper distributed
computing” he says.

Cairo was seen as a failure, because it
never shipped - although key pieces of it,
including the user interface, would resurface
in both Windows 95 and NT. “it was probably
overly ambitious,” Allchin now says.

By then, Microsoft had risen to dominance
due to its singular focus on volume, and All¬
chin’s mind-set had changed. Critics contend
that the volume strategy, designed to generate
continual upgrades while locking out com¬
petitors, lets Microsoft bring to market late,
buggy products - with fewer features than
promised - and still almost always do well.

Allchin quickly embraced the strategy as
his own. “Windows is the volume model, and
Jim became a big believer in volume,” says
Dave Mahoney, the Banyan Systems founder
who hired Allchin out of graduate school and
subsequently lost him to Redmond.

Come 1997, the Internet had taken its hold

oil the market, and questions arose about
tile future of a closed-architecfure system.

By this point Allchin had become a true
convert; He was one of the most ardent
believers in and supporters of the Windows
franchise in the face of an increasingly
open source world. His vocal support of
Windows placed him opposite the compara¬
tively Net-centric Brad Silverberg in a heated
strategic debate about cross-platform devel¬
opment and the fate of Windows.

Silverberg, another senior VP at Microsoft,
had long been involved in management of
the consumer Windows group and had
orchestrated the launch of Windows 95, in
the wake of Silverberg’s success, Gates asked
him to spearhead the struggling Internet
group, which then was engaged in the early
stages ofiLs browser war with Netscape.

The group was intent on matching Net¬
scape’s development across three operating
systems; Windows, Mac, and Unix. Silver-
berg’s team members became outspoken
advocates of rival Sun’s nascent Java plat¬
form creed, “Write once, run anywhere ”

incensed at the growing power of an idea
lie violently opposed, Allchin sent a now-

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infamous email to Gates and Paul Maritz,
Llie longtime head of developers at Microsoft.
“Windows” All chin wrote, “is in the process
of being exterminated here at Microsoft. I
consider this cross-platform issue to be a
disease within Microsoft .”

It was a critical moment at Redmond - an
issue that called for intervention from Gates
himself, who decided the matter by siding
with Allchin. According to The Wall Street
Journal , Gates, at a meeting with members
of Silverberg’s group, screamed, “Windows
is what this company is about** A few months
later, Silverberg departed on a sabbatical
from which he has yet to return.

“Although there is always debate within
Microsoft about specific implementations of
technology,” Gates told me in an email, “the
Internet protocols and infrastructure were
always going to be in Windows NT. IPs really
about combining the power of both the
Internet and Windows”

Last winter, it appeared that Silverberg
might return when, according to Silverberg
himself, Gates and Ballmer offered him con¬
trol of the consumer Windows group. But
when he said no, they turned to Allchin,

Allchin now plays down his outburst,
even while acknowledging his fear that
Microsoft was close to losing the biggest
weapon in its arsenal, “Email conversations
are a little more flamboyant," he says. “You
can't raise your voice, you can’t gesture
your hand, and so you sometimes capitalize
words, you sometimes italicize something.
And you often will just take an extreme view
to try to get people’s attention. But was J
worried? Yes. Deeply.

“We were taking code from the new ver¬
sions of Windows and moving it back to
installed base versions and not charging for
it sufficiently, in my view” he says. “And there
were mail messages about the move to clone
the Windows APIs in Java, which I strongly
disagreed with. I saw no reason lo do this. It
would do nothing but create an alternative
to Windows that would confuse customers"

And so Allchin won the battle - with tactics
quite at home inside Microsoft, a company
Famous for raging internal conflagrations as
part of its corporate culture. Supporters of
opposing strategies square off for weeks at a
time, peppering each other and their bosses
with emails and memos. Only the strongest

arguments are expected to survive. It’s an
environment in which Allchin, with his
directness, has flourished.

“Jim has been a key contributor to the
business since be joined Microsoft,” Gates
responds when J ask about Allchin’s role
and character. “His initial charter was to
drive the company’s networking-product
strategy. Since Lken he has led the develop¬
ment and marketing efforts for Windows,
including Windows NT/2000, Windows
98, and streaming media. He’s a brilliant
technologist, visionary, and a strong leader”

A llchin may have saved Windows, but at
what cost? The onetime champion of
a distributed, decentralized computing system
now oversees, in W2K, a monstrous piece
of software that critics like Sun CEO Scott
McNealy deride as “The Big llairbafl.”

Allchin says much of the bulk has been
added in recent years to suppoit functions
that Microsoft couldn’1 have anticipated early
on., and he balks at the suggestion that W2K
seems about as far from Ills early dreams as
he could have traveled. Distributed comput¬
ing is still on his mind, he says. “There are

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some debates that we’ve had for years, and
we’re still having for years. Gross-platform is
one that came up, and it was twisted six ways
to Sunday. Cross-platform can mean different
things. People can change their views.

“Distributed computing is about having
computers talk to each other” Allchin con¬
tinues. “Each vendor is responsible for
supporting standard protocols so that the
different boxes can talk to each other. My
energy has been focused on intelligent
machines communicating with each other,

1 am a hardcore believer in distributed com¬
puting. Competitors might try to position
Windows as about desktop computing. That
is totally ridiculous today. 77

W hile still passionate about big issues,
as the year comes to a close Allchin is
most concerned with making a go of W2K in
the short term. Fortune 500 IT managers
don't like the bleeding edge, and hugs, of
course, get in the way of multimiUion-dollar
purchasing decisions. Additionally, the suc¬
cess of W2K’s predecessor, NT 4.0, could
actually hurt the new product, “On the
server side, NT has jusl been fantastic ”
says Ziff-Davis chief analyst Aaron Gold¬
berg, noting that because NT has worked
so well, many won’t upgrade. On the client
side, uptake may come faster, but “Linux is
sneaking around I he corner.”

The delays may have hurt Microsoft most,
in fact, by allowing Linux to make much
heralded inroads with PC makers. Even
staunchly Microsoft-loyal Dell Computer
announced in September that it would begin
offering Linux to customers upon request.

Still, Allchin is not without his allies. All
the major manufacturers have committed to
carrying W2K to market. Micron Electronics,
for example, plans to implement it most
significantly in high-end workstations and
servers. “I was pleasantly surprised at how
strong it was ” says Micron VP Michael Gale.

“The more features they bundle, the more
of a deal the product seems to be” says IDC
analyst Dan Kusuetzky. “And that locks out
the competition by forcing them to come
to market with the same features at the
same price.”

But Kusnetzky also sees a potential hurdle
at the high end, “Microsoft’s own business
model is getting in the way. It sells a com¬
modity product, and every 15 to 18 months

builds an upgrade ” he says, “Every two
releases or so, the requirements of the
software have gotten so big the machines
have to be replaced. If Fve bought a three-
quarters-of-a-miliion-dollar multiprocessor
server, Pm not going to replace it that often.”

T o meet die needs of a changing environ¬
ment, Steve Ballmer and Paul Maritz
announced in mid-September a strategy
acknowledging that not every computer con¬
nected to the Internet need run Microsoft
software. IPs a position notably similar to the
one held by the firebrands in Silverberg’s
Internet group before they were slapped
down by Gates. Appearing before an audi¬
ence of press and analysts in San Francisco’s
Sheraton Palace hotel, Maritz announced,
“People don’t have to buy into our whole
programming infrastructure to interoperate.”

Allchin, as it happened, was not present.
Perhaps because the message didn’t align
with the strategy he’d been hawking. Or
maybe because he was in Redmond, killing
bugs. Either way, he was sounding a bit
defeated several weeks before launch. “IPs
bard, because Pm super proud of what we’ve
accomplished” he said. “But at the same
time, I can be depressed at setting high goals

some fresh blood. You can’t ask those inside
to reengineer from inside, because they’re
too wedded to what they’ve learned ”

True to bow former colleagues describe
him - as extremely honest - Allchin says
upper management is working on any num¬
ber of such problems. “We are reengineering
ourselves” he says. “IPs just a long grind.”

Is Allchin experiencing a crisis of faith?

Or has be become just another complacent
Microsoft millionaire? One email exchange
away from the fate of Brad Siiverberg -
on permanent sabbatical? In late August,
rumors began to circulate that AJlchin was
on his way out. And while he may pay such
gossip little mind, there are indications that
he could certainly find enjoyment in life
beyond Microsoft. For starters, he and his
wife, Catherine (a former employee of
Waggener Edstrom, Microsoft’s PR firm),
had their first efiild this summer. On top of
that, Allchin recently finished building a
home studio for his other passion, the guitar.

But in the midst of sweating over the little
things in the days before launch - like the
time it takes for his computer to wake up
after he sets it to hibernate - he remained
all business.

The last time I saw him, Allchin sat at a

W2K has 29 million lines of code

in its client version alone. Scott McNealy
calls it "The Big Hairball."

and not quite reaching them. I can tell you so
many things that we should have done better.
And if you talk to my team, they can, too.”

So while Microsoft contemplates the post-
Windows future - a future once imagined by
Allchin and then abandoned for the good of
the company - one has to wonder what lies
ahead for the man behind W2K. Some say
it’s impossible to accomplish anything inside
Microsoft these days: too many internal bat¬
tles, too little sense of urgency, and an insti¬
tutional fatigue from the antitrust trial. Any
vision with legs is quashed.

“It’s a huge Goliath, and changing a cul¬
ture is very difficult based on dictate,” says
an executive with a major PC manufacturer.
“I don’t necessarily see the incredible market-
share-grabbing energy that in my opinion
ended with NT. There’s a stream of manage¬
ment that’s not focused enough. They need

conference table with 22 programmers, trying
to motivate them during a weekly bug report
on the workstation version of W2E. “Have
you guys seen Millennium? Their hibernate
is much, much faster,” he said. “It’s pathetic!
You guys gotta see Millennium 1"

It was a cheap ploy - playing one develop¬
ment group against another - but the staff
took it in stride. After some back-and-forth
as to whether there was something unique
about Allchin’s Toshiba notebook, they
promised to have a look. “Well, if you get it
in the 25-second range, we won’t be totally
humiliated,” he said with a small laugh.

For Jim Allchin, life at Microsoft has been
a series of compromises - some smaller
than others, um m

Senior writer Chip Bayers (chip@wired.com)
wrote about AOL in Wired 7.10,

070

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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It all started with a pair of sunglasses. 441 patents later, Oakley hopes
its sports gear will make extreme history. By Andrew Tilin

I n Southern California, a land where exposure is highly
coveted, the sprawling gray building that houses Oak¬
ley Inc. stands aloof on a hill. 1 can't find a sign at the
bottom of the facility's long, winding driveway, hut as
1 come over a rise Vm greeted by a rooftop skull-and-
crossbones flag waving in the breeze. I walk up to a huge
steel-and-concrete doorway, the entrance to Oakley's
“interplanetary headquarters " Above the opening is
a silvery 0. inside is a dark and cavernous lobby with
an arching 50-foot ceiling, a torpedo-as-statue, and
fighter-pilot ejection seats from a B-52 for furniture:
Art deco meets apocalypse.

At the Far end of the room, I see Colin Baden, Oak¬
ley's 37-year-old president and second-in-command.

He adjusts the Oakleys perched on his shaven head and
ambles over, “Here's our Church of Satan, 1 * he says with
a straight face, lie gives me an adhesive label that reads

ESCORTED VISITOR to slap on my Oakley's otherworldly
shirt. The white sticker will turn headquarters-eum
red in 24 hours. At that point, Foothi "

if I m fool enough to get caught

wandering the premises, I’ll be unceremoniously tossed.

“We have cameras and alarms throughout the place”
Baden warns. “There are guys watching.”

Some welcome. But at Oakley, the celebrated Orange
County manufacturer of futuristic sunglasses, the staff
isn't used to dealing with aliens. The 24-year-old outfit
has always kept to itself, and it's hard to argue with this
solitary’ style: The $232 million company saw its sales
increase by 20 percent last year - 250 percent in the
last five years. Oakley owns as much as 60 percent of
the premium-sunglasses market, where shades cost
$60 and up. In the last 18 months Oakley has expanded
its line of active clothing, introduced unusual sneakers,

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

IMAGE: GAIL ALBEfiT HALABAN

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in the main lobby
of Oakley Inc, a
receptionist peeks out
from behind her
welcoming desk.

and rolled out the Time Bomb, a rugged
sports watch. The $48 million* 417,000-
square-foot building is obviously a place
where inspired concepts are hatched.

But what may be Oakley's wildest notion
was unveiled just six months ago, when the
company announced it has every intention
of leapfrogging Bay-Ban, the industry's $400
million Goliath, to be a billion-dollar brand.
Even more audacious, Oakley plans to do so
without losing its edge.

“We won't make more stuff just to sell
more stuff," says Jim Jannard, the compa¬
ny's reclusive, iconoclastic 50-year-old
founder and chair. “We'll make more cool
stuff because we're so excited about the
possibilities that we can hardly stand it.
Becoming a billion-dollar company will he
the inevitable result ”

This enginee r-it- an d- tfa ey- wi 11 - c om e
approach has its detractors. “Throughout
its existence Oakley has made breakthroughs
in the field” says Marge Axel rad, editorial
director for the Jobson Optical Group, a
New York-based publisher of optical-indus¬
try magazines. “But that's as a niche brand

appealing to a limited audience. To elevate
lhat mystique to a much higher level is
extraordinarily ambitious”

Stockholders haven't shown much regard
for Jannard's rhetoric either. Despite Oakley's
profitability, its four-year-old issues were
recently trading at less than 25 percent of

their all-time high of $27, mainly because
of Wall Street's doubts about Oakley's growth
potential. Stock analysts see in Oakley a clas¬
sic conundrum: Is the founder, who brought
the company success by defying convention,
really the best guy to take his business
mainstream? For virtually all of 1999, the
investment banking firm Deutsche Banc
Alex.Brown's answer has been a polite no.

It rated Oakley's stock “market perform,”
brokerese for “don't buy”

“The billion-dollar goal ” says one market
maven, “is currently just a flying leap.”

Say what the skeptics will, Oakley is

convinced that broad-brand expansion is
the logical and natural next step. With their
sunglasses already endorsed by an army of
sponsored athletes that includes Michael
Jordan, Jannard and Baden believe that
wider success is, in part, a matter of having
a giant coming-out party - and to throw it,
Oakley installed a marketing expert from
Gatoradc as CEO.

“A lul of Lhe growth we've promised can
resull from just letting people know what
w r e already make” says Baden. What Oakley
creates, he insists, is not sunglasses, but
sculpture. “We're inventors using techno¬
logy lo make artistic creations with mechan¬
ical souls ” he says.

Baden certainly kicks off lhe company
tour in original fashion. I follow him out of
the lobhy, through a conference room, and
past a hidden door. “This is where they
planned my kidnapping” he says, nicking
a switch that bathes a dusty corridor in red
light. We walk to an opening where several
black helmets set on top of 12 gym lockers.

A chalkboard to one side is scrawled with
words like delta,flash, and trouble.

“We've got guys here who like to dress up
like a SWAT team and grab people” Baden
says, chuckling. “For my 371 h birthday they
kidnapped me and threw me out of a plane.”

I n 1975, Jim Jannard was a 25-year-old
dropout from the pharmacy school at
USC. He sold motorcycle parts out of a
Honda Civic, naming his distribution
company after his English setter, Oakley.

Jannard had always been mechanically
minded; as a kid growing up outside LA,
he drew engine pieces and built a helium-
balloon flying machine. So it was natural for
him to start thinking about improvements
on the handlebar grips he was peddling.

“J'd have suggestions, and the response
was typically, ‘Shut up and go sell,' ” says
Jannard. “So I executed my own ideas ”
Jannard invented unique cam-shaped grips
that became a hit. The grips led to motor¬
cycle goggles in the late 1970s and, later, to
ski goggles. Then, during a particularly sun-
blinded drive from San Diego to LA in 1983,

Oakley's wildest notion yet is to become a

billion-dollar brand - without losing its edge.

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

□ 7B

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Oakley second-in-
command Colin Baden
sits ready for battle in
an ejector seat from
a mothballed B-52 - his
idea of office furniture.

Jannard started thinking about his next
move: “I figured, 'Why not put goggle char¬
acteristics like peripheral protection and
face fit into sunglasses?’”

iannard worked on the design for more
than a year before Oakley’s Tkrminator-\ook
shields, first called Factory Pilots and later
Eyeshades, debuted in 1985. Other sun¬
glasses execs guffawed at w r hat looked like
goggle lenses that had been orphaned and
attached to spindly temples. But an Ameri¬
can cyclist named Greg LeMond discovered
Oakleys and started racing in them. When he
finished second in die 1985 Tour de France,
the shades were legitimized overnight,

“Our first products incorporated lens
geometry so there would be terrific optics ”
Jannard says. “We received patents right
from the start ” Jannard used existing cor¬
rective technology to compensate for the
view-distorting potential of highly curved
lenses and worked it into a shield style.
More aesthetically pleasing models called
Blades and Razor Blades quickly followed
the Eyeshades, By 1991, Jannard and his
approximately 200-person company released

the dual-lens, wrap around-style Eye Jacket
The Eye Jacket offered a level of precise
craftsmanship unprecedented in the indus¬
try. Jannard claims they’re the first pair of

sunglasses with frames formed solely from
computerized data. Since that digital break¬
through, Oakley has created increasingly
complex frames and lenses while exploring
new materials.

Along the way, the company stockpiled
patents - it now has 441 of them, compared
with the 155 that 62-year-old Ray-Ban
owns. And Oakley comes down aggressively
on copycats: It has flushed out numerous
small-time operations that make knockoffs.

“Last year Oakley produced 3 million
frames, and there were another million
counterfeit models out there," says Gregg
Weeks, Oakley’s general counsel. “Every¬
thing Oakley makes gets copied ."

To hear Weeks and Jannard tell it, major

sunglasses manufacturers are busy swiping
Oakley’s designs as well, Oakley has sued
each of them for patent infringement and
has won hundreds of such cases against
large and small firms alike.

Jannard’s company is now tangling with
Nike. Oakley claims that Nike, a relative new¬
comer to the sunglasses market, copied its
XYZ Optics design for the RV8 and RV12 eye-
wear lines. Nike’s lawyers counter that the
patent isn’t valid, because it’s based on wide¬
ly known optical principles. Many of Oakley’s
browbeaten competitors would love to see
Nike win the trial, coming up sometime late
next year, (A federal judge has already issued
a preliminary ruling in Oakley’s favor.)

Since 1995, when he took Oakley public to
boost a then-sagging cash flow, Jannard has
been a multimillionaire, and he’s become
increasingly secretive. He lives with his wife
in seclusion on one of the San Juan Islands
in Washington State and commutes to the
Oakley offices every other week by private
aircraft. He refuses to have his picture tak¬
en, almost never gives interviews, and turns
his public appearances into performance
art. Last summer, when Oakley opened its
one-of-a-kind 0 Store in a SoCal mall,
Jannard was there wearing a gas mask and
giving his speech through a megaphone.

So Fm not especially shocked when,
the first time we plan to meet, Jannard
stands me up. Fm at Oakley HQ, but it

turns out he’s not even in town.

“Fm terrifically absentminded * he tells
me later. “1 missed the appointment because
I forgo t”

Where was he? “Uh ,,. somewhere off the
Earth.

“We isolate ourselves to stay away from
ordinary thought or the state of the art as it
currently exists ” Jannard continues, sound¬
ing exasperated. “If you can understand
that, then you could like us.”

T’m on the restricted side of a locked black-
.land-yellow door that warns, in red letters,
CAUTION: CONTENTS UNDER EXTREME PRESSURE.
Baden is showing me the fluorescenMit
Oakley design department, a sprawling

The Eye Jacket, says Jannard, sported the first
sunglasses frames formed solely from digital data.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

□ 70

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After countless paper
visions and revisions
by designers like Toby
Rohrback (right J, the
prototype count for a
single Oakley model
sometimes tops 1,000.

space with windowed offices around its
perimeter. Tacked to one workspace wall is
a drawing of a vicious-looking, masklike
objecL On a table in another room is a day
carving of a rounded piece of armor that
appears to snap over one's ears, with a slit
for the eyes. I take a point-and-shoot from
my shoulder bag and aim it at a desk covered
with sketches, “Yon canT take a picture in
here” says Baden. “We don't want to give
away the store ”

Baden and I walk over to his open, tidy
office area, and he grabs some drawings
from a table behind his desk. The company^
eyewear evolves from random creations and
drawings by Oakley’s six designers. I’m
shown a number of sunglasses temples that
look like arrows; ideas for hinging mecha¬
nisms and other parts have been borrowed
from the landing gear of a jet and the door
handle of a Porsche, it can take months to
approve a designer’s concept, but getting
the final OK is refreshingly unbureaucratic;
Jannard and Baden simply give a thumbs-
up. “Focus groups only produce what people
expect” says Baden with a shrug, “We like
to deliver the unexpected ”

Baden landed his job at Oakley, aptly
enough, by surprising Jannard, In 1993 he
was a partner at a Bellevue, Washington,
architecture firm when he met Oakley’s
founder, who was looking to build a house.
Jannard show r ed Baden a couple of draw¬
ings and a dip from Blade Runner, Then he

gave the candidate a pencil and 45 minutes.
Baden produced a weird-looking pyramid,
cut in half, with a freight train running over
the top of it,

Baden’s hyperbolic sensibility clicked with
Jannard, He hired Baden’s firm to continue
drawing homes, and two years later, Baden
blueprinted Oakley’s headquarters. By 1996

the architect became the company’s design
director; earlier this year Jannard made
him president.

We head to the rear of the department,
stepping into a window less room with two
while-metal-and-glass boxes that look like
kitchen cabinets. Baden motions to a guy
standing in front of a keyboard and monitor,
and suddenly one of the empty kitchen cabi¬
nets comes alive. A laser beam is firing down
into a vat of toxic, light-reactive resin that
runs $2,000 a liter. There’s a racket as the
beam snakes around the resin in blue bolts
of light delivered via digital commands.
After six hours of this, a pair of prototype
sunglasses frames will emerge, bearing the
precise specs the designer called for. What
looks like a cupboard is actually a $600,000
stereo lithography accumulator, a device

used mostly in the aerospace industry for
designing things like turbine blades.

“This is just the beginning” says Baden.
He motions me to follow him out the door.

We walk into another room, where
several CAD stations are set up. At various
stages - hand-sculpting, prototyping, and
scanning - an embryonic pair of Oakleys

ends up on one of the monitors, “Sec all this
complexity?” asks Baden as he holds up a
pair of purple Oakley Minute sunglasses
and points to the carefully rounded temples,
“That’s an insane amount of work ”

Even now, the best scanning equipment
available can provide Oakley CAD modelers
with a 3-D image of the frame that’s only
about 25 percent accurate. The real touch-
up is done using a mouse as if it were sand¬
paper. Getting a pair of glasses just so -
Baden and his designers nitpick over details
smaller than five-thousandths of an inch -
can lake a modeler a solid month of 16-hour
days. Then the data is used to precisely cut
tooling that can cost more than $200,000.

“Look at the way the surfaces blend ” says
Baden. “There’s continuity. The lines flow
like the body on a race ear” CAD modelers

"We isolate ourselves to stay away from ordinary

thought/' says Oakley's founder."lf you can
understand that, then you could like us."

WIRED DECEMBER 1599

IMAGES: GAIL ALBERT HALABAN

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To prevent distortion,
lenses are placed on
an Alders on head form,
then red lasers are
fired through the eyes.

Kurt Sabin and Dean Jacobsen stand behind
him, smiling. Then he sets the Minutes
down and picks up a black-framed pair of
sunglasses made by a competitor.

"See those curves? They don’t even line
up! And look at the dents on the nose bridge!
The nose bridged

As I study the two pairs, I realize he’s
right. The Oakleys do look like sculpture.
The arduous design process always brings
Baden’s soldiers "to the point where they
say they can’t do it again,” he proudly
admits. At Oakley, the prototype count for
one model has topped 1,000.

“These aren’t sunglasses," says Baden,
staring at a frame prototype up on a screen,
"They’re complex visual ideas painfully
captured in data.”

O n a warm day last June, Jim Jannard
was at the Oakley HQ addressing about
500 people tied to the company. He stood
before them in Oakley’s auditorium and
promised a brighter future than his corpo¬
ration’s leaden stock would indicate. Oakley,
he explained from behind a podium resem¬
bling a giant cog, had its sights set on global
domination,

"Making the leap from the best sunglasses
company in the world to a world-class
brand is a natural transition” he promised.
Then Jannard left the floor, and most of
the details about how all this was going
to happen, to Bill Schmidt, his new - and,

X Metal provided the thrill of inventing a material,
an aesthetic, and a process all at the same time.

years ago, Oakley’s stock has been below
$20 since 1997, just before a retail-sunglasses
glut caused company sates to drop temp¬
orarily by $25 million. Last fall, shares were
trading at a paltry $6, The problem? Mainly
the lag in new products and Oakley’s not-
ahvays-successful attempts to diversify.
Even though the eyewear numbers have
rebounded, Oakley introduces at best a
handful of new shades every year. Each pair
may be seamless, but while the Oakley arti¬
sans toil away, Ray-Ban easily churns out
20 to 40 new looks annually. Meanwhile,
Oakley’s American-made athletic shoes,
which it started manufacturing a year and
a half ago, are losing money.

“Shoes that are too expensive, a shortage
of new product, and not enough media,”
summarizes Marcia Aaron, a managing

The $190 sunglasses’ first-month numbers
were superior to those of any other new-
product release in company history,

"I’ve heard the argument, L We’re not into
fashion, we’re into technology, and the looks
will follow,’” Schmidt said. “Well, sorry, but
fashion has been an opportunity here just
waiting to happen.”

Schmidt’s intentions seemed to match
Jannard’s ambitions, but his personality,
like the commercially successful but aes¬
thetically underachieving OOs, was an odd
fit al Oakley. While Jannard appreciated
what Schmidt and the OOs did for Oakley’s
bottom line, he said, "1 wouldn’t w r ear them ”
Jannard and Schmidt’s philosophies, if
not at complete odds, were clashing. "Grow¬
ing pains,” Schmidt assured me over the
summer, three months into his new job.

it turned out, temporary - CEO.

An 0 will ultimately circle the earth,
Schmidt declared, now that the company
is b eing "rei n t ro d li ce d

Jannard hired Schmidt, who in the 1980s
and ’90s helped expand Gatorade from a
$100 million business to a $1.7 billion busi¬
ness, because the Oakley chair was growing
concerned aboul "the expectations of our
investors.” After peaking at $27 a share four

director at Deutsche Banc
Alex.Brown.

Schmidt, who came on as CEO
in May after sitting on Oakley’s
board of directors for 18 months,
went hard at it from the start.

He added a former MasterCard
sports-marketing VP to his staff
and hired a boutique ad agency
in San Diego to kick off a print-
advertising campaign. The ads
are meant to appeal to Oakley’s
18- to 34-year-old customer base
- as are most of the company’s
roughly 1,000 sponsored athletes.

Oakley tends to support Lite
edgy and flamboyant: Dennis
Rodman, drag-racing celeb
Scotty Cannon, Norway’s defiant
superchamp snowboarder, Terje
Maakonsen. But athletes who
appeal to a wider audience - like Mark
McGwire, golfer David Duval, and the ever¬
lasting MJ - are increasingly important
parts of the lineup. It was Michael Jordan,
a longtime Oaklcv fan, who suggested that
the company could broaden its reach by
making a more traditional line of sun¬
glasses. Schmidt was all for it.

Last summer, Oakley introduced the
relatively generic, wire-rimmed 00 models.

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A coordinate-measuring
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Sounding upbeat, he added, “Anyone who
wears glasses can be an Oakley consumer”

The flip side of that proclamation, of
course, is the possibility that too many
aunties and plumbers sporting the 0 will
set off Lhe dork alarm, U happened to Nike*
a $9 billion company whose profits halved
in 1998 in pari because of swoosh oversat 11 -
ration* “When we’re at a few billion, Fll
worry” Schmidt replied with a shrug.

For a second opinion I called Irma ZandL
who heads an eponymous New York-based
company that tracks trends among the
under-30 crowd. She agreed with Schmidt*
“It’s absolutely possible to be cool and have
a big business. Look at Gap or Volkswagen.
Mom can cruise around in a Jetta, and her
kids can still want a Beetle”

One afternoon i do a Little market
research of my own* 1 drive to the Irvine
Spectrum Center for a firsthand look at the
company’s attempts to keep its cross-genera¬
tional cool. Among Lhe mall’s generic shops,
the 0 Store stands out* Inside the brightly lit
1,790-square-foot space, kids with two-tone
hair grab at shirts hanging on space-age
clothing racks, while middle-aged women
inspect Oakley Shoe Twos* Thumping alter¬
native music complements a 45-square-foot
video screen showing skateboarders in
action*

Fm trying on a pair of copper Topcoat
glasses and a skullcap when I realize there’s
a crowd gathering at the back of the shop*

“I don't know - it just caught my eye,”
says a customer, who is taken aback at the
gawkers he’s attracted* lie holds his left arm
out while assistant manager Susie Jacobson
fits a gleaming $t,300 Time Bomb watch to
his wrist.

Nearly everyone in the place is admiring
it. “ 1 was going to buy a Tag Heuer, but this

is strange, which is good” he says. The 0
Store staffers nod in approval* “1 like it” he
declares, “because it says, 'Ream me up*’”

O n a 9 a.m. plane bound From Orange
County to Reno, Nevada, Carlos Reyes is
already talking in high-octane Oakley-speak*
“Jim likes to say that we have an absolute
obsession with making inventions that solve
unsolved problems,” says Reyes, the compa¬
ny’s goateed, 33-year-old vice president of
B&D* “When it came to X Metal, we didn’t
even know of the problems* Ail we had to
work with was the dream of an artistic
metal frame.”

We’re en route to Oakley’s X Metal facility*
Reyes says that in the early ’90s Jannard
conceived of sunglasses with sculptured
metal frames that weren’t made out of the

usual wire or stamped alloy* After years
of intermittent research split among his
employees, Jannard settled on making the
glasses out of an alloy from the titanium
family because titanium is lightweight and
hypoallergenic, and it has a better strength-
to-weight ratio than other metals* “Then we
had to find somewhere to manufacture it”

s ays R eye s, gra b b i ng h i s s h o u I der b ag a s
the plane stops at the gate.

We drive 55 miles southeast through the
brown-scrub desert. On the outskirts of the
small town of Dayton, a skull-and-cross-
bones Hies next to an anonymous building*
Jannard plunked down about $7 million in
1996 for all the X Metal equipment and the
62,000-square-foot facility, which used to
be a golf-club factory.

“But we were still asking ourselves if we
were going to be able to really make these
frames” says Reyes, leading me into a room
that smells like melting candles. Workers
in blue aprons and clear-lens Oakleys
are forming thousands of green, waxlike
sunglasses parts on 11 presses*

Most businesses that use titanium farm
out the manufacturing because working

"We call this place Hades/' says the VP of R&D.

If liquid X Metal comes in contact with water,
he warns, there will be a "Hindenburg scenario."

DeO

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

IMAGES: GAEL ALBERT HA LA BAN

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Today, they asked if you were done yet.

with the metal is so tricky,

“I tried to discourage Jannard from fool¬
ing with it None of his people liar! casting
backgrounds” says Bob Geisendorfer, a con-
suiting metallurgist who has specialized in
titanium for three decades, “Apparently that
wasn’t going to get in his way.”

Jannard wanted control of the process so
Oakley designs wouldn’t be hobbled by any
manufacturing restrictions. After much trial
and error, X Metal frames were born in 1997,
using a technique called investment casting.

Reyes starts walking me through the plant
and the manufacturing steps: Several dozen
of the w'axy sunglasses parts are attached to
a 2-foot plastic tree. The entire assembly is
dipped into a series of tubs containing par¬
ticles and polymers that ultimately harden
into ceramic coatings. “Now comes the
climax ” says Reyes, We walk into a dark,
industrial workspace w r here men wear sil¬
very fire-retardant suits and welding masks.
They’re milling around in front of giant
furnaces, concrete bunkers, and enormous
steam machines.

“We call this place Hades" Reyes says.

'The grit-encrusted trees get an 80G-degree-
Fahrenheh steam bath, which melts the
waxy sunglasses parts inside and frees the
resulting green goop through gates in the
trees. What’s left is a series of hollow ceramic

molds. The tree is set in a gigantic steel
cylinder behind 16-inch-thick concrete walls.
Once the vessel is clamped shut, the silver-
suited men back off, we retreat into a win¬
dowed bunker, and red lights begin to flash.
Smoke spews from behind the wall as all the
air is sucked out of the vessel, (If the liquid
X Metal cooking inside comes in contact with
w ater, there will be a “Hindmburg scenario ”
offers Reyes.) An attendant in a beret moves
a joystick On a black-and-white TV monitor
we watch a 6-mch-thiek cylinder of metal
get melted by an electric arc.

“Four hundred fifty thousand watts of
power!” exclaims Reyes. On the screen we
watch the 4,600-degree alloy pour into

a funnel feeding the gales that channel
X Metal into the molds. When the tree
comes out of the cylinder, it’s white-hot.

The process is far from over. After
computer-controlled drilling, belt sanding,
and a temple-by-temple inspection for air
bubbles on a $100,000 real-time X-ray
machine, the lenses are popped in and
lhe finished products are boxed up. About
70 employees at the X Metal facility put
out 7,000 to 10,000 pairs of sunglasses a
month, which is slow. (Some low-end, off¬
shore sunglasses factories produce as
much in two days.)

I walk out of ihe X Metal facility, dazed
as I reenter the sunny, warm Nevada after¬
noon. Reyes comes outside, and we gel in
the car and head back to the airport. While
nobody at Oakley will provide me with
specifics, en route Reyes guarantees that X
Metal sunglasses, at between $250 and $315
apiece, make the company a healthy profit
“But that isn’t the only reason we pursued
X Metal ” says Reyes. “It was Ihe Lhrill of try¬
ing to invent a material, an aesthetic, and a
manufacturing process all at the same time ”

W hen Jim Jannard commits to meeting
me several weeks later, he rolls out
his version of a red carpet,

“Pretty wicked, huh?” brags Greg Schwartz
as we approach the gray airplane with a
giant skull-and-crossbones on the fuselage.
It’s an unseasonably crisp late-summer day at

Bellingham International, a diminutive air¬
port 90 miles north of Seattle. Schwartz, one
of Jannard’s two full-time pilots, helps me
climb the ladder of the 60-foot, single-prop
De Havilland. We’re en route to JannarcPs
500-acre fiefdom in the San Juan Islands.

It’s a 15-minute flight over a calm Puget
Sound to Jannard’s island, which is shaped
sort of like a bowling pin. Right after
Schwartz kills the engine and I climb out,
Jannard pulls up in a Hummer. “Enjoy your
flight?” he asks as 1 hop into the off-white,
military-spec, four-wheeling vehicle. At
6' 2 Tt , Jannard is big-boned, with an austere,
close-cropped head of hair and a gray beard.
Only his voice doesn’t convey MacGyver :

Jannard's private San Juan island hosts imported

deer, elk, sheep, and a yellow fire truck.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

□ 80

IMAGE: GAEL ALBERT HALABAN

It’s an octave too high. “This is no Newport
Beach highway cruiser” He puts the Hum¬
mer into gear. “It’s a working truck”

Starting down one of the island’s dirt
roads, Jannard gives me a comprehensive
torn’. There are imported deer, elk, and
sheep and stout Douglas firs and maples.
There are also his-and-her boats in the
small harbor for Jannard and his wife -
and a yellow fire truck. Despite the island’s
considerable beauty, Jannard seems more
interested in showing off his toys. Another
plane sits in a hangar, as docs an old Land
Rover beating two inoperative machine
guns. Jannard also owns a yellow-and-
black vehicle - part minivan, part tank -
that was featured in Judge Dredd. There's
a makeshift driving range near the couple’s
clapboard home, though Jannard isn’t
as keen on playing golf as he is on design¬
ing clubs.

“1 like cool stuff. 1 love cool stuff. I need
cool stuff” he confesses as we sip tea in a
kitchen nook that has a commanding view
of the blue water. The cozy, cedar-lined,
two-story house is temporary. If Jannard
and Baden can ever hash out the aesthetics
of the stone-and-steel dream home, it will
be bail l on the island.

*Tm consumed with the concept of Oakley,
which to me means giving your most radical
effort to making something better” says
Jannard, grabbing a frosted oatmeal cookie.
“When that thinking comes to sunglasses,
sometimes l he result will be a pair so out¬
landish that most people won’t immediately
be comfortable with them. To me, dial’s OK”

Jannard himself is never afraid to wear
“the full dose of Oakley thinking” as he calls
it. Today it’s a relatively conservative ensem¬
ble that’s not yet in stores: a polo-style black
Oakley shirt, Shoe Threes, and a pair of X
Metal glasses he sets on the table. Unfortu¬
nately for Jannard, his backers don’t wear it
all as well as lie does. Instead, they’re more
in line with Schmidt’s sensibility: The more
Oakley product that appeals to more people,
the better. When 1 raise the subject, he ges¬
tures to the specs on the table. “We’ll never
make a commodity. Ever.”

I read him what Schmidt told me: “With
designers, it’s always tinker, tinker, tinker.
But at some point they have to break pen¬
cils and say, ‘This is it.’”

As he listens, Jannard moves the smooth

temples of the glasses open and closed,
“Well, we aren’t going to sell anything with
defects ” he says adamantly. “That’s out.
Forget that.”

His response to Oakley’s weak share price?
Buy hack the stock. This year alone he’s spent
nearly $8.2 million doing so: With some 60
percent of the pie, he’s the majority share¬
holder by far.

“People in the public arena don’t appreci¬
ate who we are,” Jannard continues, “Oakley
is a product-driven firm trying to make
things that will keep us successful for years,
and meanwhile the investors dwell on quar¬
terly results.” Jannard is about to take
another bite of his cookie hut decides he has
more to say. “Sure, the stock price irritates
me. It irritates the shit out of me,” he con¬
tinues. “But the remedy isn’t just to grow
our business. It’s to grow it in an elegant
way." The house phone rings, and Jannard
runs to answer it.

He returns and siLs down for not two min¬
utes before it rings again. Then his cell
phone goes off, playing the theme from Hie
Lone Ranger. Then it’s the house phone
again. The tea gets cold. “1 rarely look back¬
ward, but going public is something I wish 1
hadn't done,” he says between calls, “I want
Oakley to be big, hut big alone isn’t cool.”

We go outside and walk a couple hundred
yards to a smaller structure that’s locked.
Jannard opens the door and leads me past

like Scotty Cannon, the Oakley-sponsored
drag racer. But when it comes to designing
glasses, which he still does frequently,
Jannard pushes all the cool stuff aside.

“I’ll just grab a crummy piece of paper and
a pencil and start noodfing. Then PH fax it
to the office” he says. Surprising, perhaps,
when you consider that Oakley has
embraced high tech with a passion no com¬
petitor can match. But then Jannard is all
for doing things differently.

“There’s no upside to being a business
celebrity” he says while driving me back to
the island run way. “There are people who
will like what I do and people who won’t like
what I do. As I get more successful, that only
means more fans - and more detractors "

As we pull up in front of the De Havil-
land, 1 think of the irony in Jim Jannard’s
universe. His whole career has been dedi¬
cated to a product that’s designed to call
attention to its wearer, bul what he wants
is to disappear at will.

N ine days after my visit, I receive a one-
sheet fax from Oakley. Schmidt has
resigned, effective immediately. Jannard’s
call follows a few minutes later. He obvious¬
ly Blinks the company is now on its way to
fulfilling its potential,

“Instead of wailing to have someone else
take control of Oakley, I’m going to roll up
my sleeves and do it myself,” he says, “I’m so

"I rarely look backward," Jannard says."But going
public is something I wish I hadn’t done."

pictures of his seven kids, all grown and liv¬
ing off-island, into a small, dark room alive
with the buzz of fans cooling off machinery.
There’s an Apple G3 and industrial-strength
versions of a scanner, copier, and printer. In
another corner is a high-definition TV, a digi¬
tal-video machine, and camera equipment.
Jannard says a G4 will be coming soon.

Here, in an isolated building on a remote
island, away from the suits and the phones,
Jannard can concentrate. “1 looked all over
the world before I found this place ” he says.
“This is home to how 1 think.”

Jannard sits down in front of the monitor
and shows me how he uses his setup to create
personal and business videos, manipulate
photographs, and build Web sites for guys

stoked to be back in the saddle!” Jannard is
politic about Schmidt’s departure. “Two
great entities don’t always fit together” he
says. Whal of the plan to satisfy sharehold¬
ers? “We’ll still have some adult supervision
here,” he insists, “And I’ll be at the company
headquarters for every important meeting.

“But I’ve got to go” he adds. “I’ve got a
company to run” We hang up. And 1 wonder
if this isn’t the crisis he needs.

“I’ve been discouraged by everything I’ve
tried to do ” Jannard told me once, “And
being discouraged inspires me ” ■ ■ ■

Andrew Tilin (tilin@nets.com) is based in
Santa Fe } New Mexico . He also writes for
Outside, Worth, and The New r York Times.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

nan

Click Dynasty

Sina.com - the merger of a Beijing software power and a Silicon Valley
startup - is about to become the Chinese AOL.Only bigger. By David Sheff

n the small hours of the morning on May 7,1999, Wang
Zhidoug lay awake, worrying about the usual. Missed
deadlines. Server crashes. Post-ship bugs. But he never
contemplated the real-life nightmare that hit at dawn.

For the previous six months, he had been busy inte¬
grating his former company, SRS - the largest Internet
and software company in China - with Palo Alto-based
Sinanet, the primary American and Taiwanese portal for
the world's Chinese population outside of China, Once
negotiations began last November, it took 32 days and
many sleepless nights to iron out the details of this East-
West alliance. But the promise of reaching upwards of
100 million people by 2003 was too great to pass up. And
while every new Net-era company gets hyped as revolu¬
tionary, Sina.com, as the new multinational is called,
really is. It connects Chinese speakers worldwide and,

Sma.com CEO Wang
Zhrdang says the Net
gives China a chance
to "catch up to, even
surpass, technologies
from the West."

the late-night worries were

inevitable. Mergers are messy, and Sina’s involved the
high-wire act of integrating the Chinese and US execu¬
tive teams. The alliance also brought challenges to
Wang’s leadership, and debates raged about how best to
position the company for its upcoming IPO.

And then, at 6 a.m., American jets bombed the Chinese
embassy in Belgrade. Yugoslavia, killing four Chinese
staffers and maiming two dozen others. Following the
mind-boggling cock-up, justifiably outraged Chinese citi¬
zens took to the streets of Shanghai, Beijing, and other

as such, can unite them socially,
culturally, politically - even com¬
mercially - as never before.

In the months following the
merger, Wang was confident, but

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

D9B

IMAGE: MARK LE.ONG/M ATRlX

cities for govern men t-sancti on ed protests
against the Yankees, Marching within a mile
of Sina, Beijing University students railed
against the US n while online they posted sen¬
timents like “Pay blood debts in blood.” This
was not part of the business plan*

There wasn't much time to reflect on the
fact that Sina had just joined forces with an
American company. Moreover, 4i a different
truth hit us ” says Yan Yanchou, Sina's R&D
chief and one of China's most respected com¬
puter scientists. “People in China were read¬
ing real-time news From Belgrade - talking
In one another and to others, whether they
were in Beijing or Paris or New York. West¬
erners cannot understand the importance of
this. For Chinese people, this was historic' 1
Indeed, the Belgrade fiasco proved that
Sina.com has a big role to play and, ironi¬
cally, that Wang had been right to worry
about server crashes. Within three hours of
the tragedy there were 7 million pageviews
at Sina.com, four times a typical full day's
traffic. “We would reset the servers, and
three minutes later the limits would be
reached again,” Yan recalls. There was no
letup for a week.

the room. The two men briefly confer;
they've been quite comfortable with each
other ever since meeting at a Chinese Win¬
dows convention in 1985.

After jotting down the answers to a couple
of questions, Yau shuffles down a dingy
hallway and enters a low-ccilinged room,
where tables are pushed together to form
a U. He sits dowm for a box lunch amid a
dozen PCs, cables snaking underfoot. Yan
pushes back his silver-framed glasses and
pulls up the pant legs of his khakis before
reflecting on Sina.corn's staggering potential.

While the Net still isn't available to China's
masses, the number of users is doubling
every sk months* In 1997 there were
200,000; at the start of 1999, there were 4
million; and Ihere will be at least 7 million
by 2000, says Rajeev Kupta, Goldman
Sachs' Internet analyst in Hong Kong. By
2005, some 55 million Chinese will be online,
according to BDA, an independent Chinese
research firm. BDA's analysis also shows that
the actual number of Chinese users is proba¬
bly four or live Limes that figure because
several people use each registered account
This means there could easily be 100 million-

plus users by 2005. Either way, China will
have more Internet users than any other
Asian country - including Japan - by 2004.
By the following year, it will have more desk¬
top surfers than any country but the US,

Sina.com already has more than 1 million
Chinese-speaking users, and die site is regis¬
tering 4,000 more every day from China,
Taiwan, Hong Kong, and throughout the rest
of the world* Wang says that the company
expects 8 million users within a year, and 15
to 20 million by Ihe end of 2001. The number
of Sina customers in Taiwan recendy shot up
when Sina bought a large stake in PC Home,
a profitable electronic newsletter that earns a
quarter of the entire take of Taiwan's online
advertising revenue. The numbers in the US
and Ilong Kong grow steadily, and the num¬
bers in mainland China are expected to jump
astronomically as the cost of Internet access
diminishes.

But big numbers, Yan says, don't capture
the story the way the response to the bombing
does* Even as the US offered its lame excuses
(old maps!}, millions of Chinese, inside and
outside China, gathered to read die news,
console one another, and witness the extent

I n Ids modest office at Sina's drab head¬
quarters in the district of Zhongguanchun -
Beijing's Silicon Alley - Wang, clicking away
at his Legend PC, looks up to see Yan enter

Sina.com already has more than 1 million users,
and the site registers 4,000 more every day.

to which the Net can open up China.

“To go from no exchange to such a vibrant
exchange is profound says Yan.

“China has been held back because of a
century of stagnation while the world moved
ahead” Wang adds. “The Net provides a way
to catch up to, and maybe even surpass, the
technologies from the West*"

Not coincidentally, Sina has created a
buzz in the investment world, too* Since
the merger was announced, Sina.com's IPO
has been intensely anticipated - especially
after last summer's successful offering of
Chma.com, a virtually inconsequential com¬
petitor (at least until AOL became a partner
this fall}* China.com more than tripled on its
first day out, then settled back at a level well
over double the offering price, even though
the site's ranked 39ih for traffic in China. In
the Hong Kong-based IT Daily, Neil Thylor
wrote that everybody save its founder “seems
to admit that China.com's content sucks” By
comparison, Sina is ranked, based on traffic,

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as the top destination for Chinese speakers,
both inside and out of the People’s Republic,
Still, Sina doesn’t have the market
cornered: It lias at least two rivals to take
seriously - Chinese Yahoo!, which has
roughly half Sina.conTs traffic, and Sohu, the
number-two China-based site, Sohu was
founded in 1997 by Charles Zhang, who
wrote the Sohu business plan while he was a
physics student at MIT, He showed the plan
to Media Lab director Nicholas Negroponte,
who loaned Zhang some seed money and
introduced him to other potential investors.
They agreed to back Sohu, and Zhang
returned to Beijing to build the site, which
squandered an early lead in market share.

In addition to ad revenue, Sina is looking
to generate income from econimerce. As
Michelle Yeh, Sina’s senior marketing direc¬
tor, says, “We find that people come to us
to send flowers to their mother in Thiwari
before they go to 1-800-Flowers, because
they trust that we will do the job better in a
country we are part of” Many who visit Sina
from outside China use the site to buy hard-
to-come-by products, such as mung cakes,
Yeh and company expect huge jumps in
sales on the mainland when better payment
systems are developed. (Currently, few Chi¬
nese have credit cards, but IBM and the
Bank of China are developing a system that
will allow Chinese users to pay with debit
cards online ) One Sina offering that has
been incredibly popular is its dating service.
Club Yuan (yuan means “destiTiy”)- The
company doesn’t have to look far for testi¬

The dating service, Club Yuan, is extremely popular.
Three Sina managers met their wives using it.

monials: Three of its managers met their
wives through the service.

W ang Zhidong, 31, built his company
much as he built his career - from
scratch. Raised in a poor family in the ruraf
Guangdong province, he studied hard and
was accepted by Beijing University, While
in school and after graduating, he worked as
a freelance software engineer in local tech
companies before being hired in 1989 by
the Beijing Founders Group, a branch of
the university. Then he started a company,

Chinese Star, which produced a program that
let Chinese PC users run Western applications,
VYhen Wang left G-Star, IBM, Microsoft,
and a number of state-owned enterprises
offered him a job. “He couldn’t just Lake a
job," says his wife, Liu Bing, w T ho is now
Sina’s office manager in Beijing. “He wanted
to do something bn poriant for China. He is
very patriotic, believing that we must work
to build China and help the Chinese people”
Liu says she tried to discourage him (“I
wanted him to live a calm life with regular
vacations”), but Wang didn’t listen.

Sinanet tofounders (clockwise

from top loft) Ben Tsiang,
Jack Hong, and Hurst Lin.
"Before us," says Lin r "news
from China was always late,"

Yan Yanchou, meanwhile - the son of a
government official accused of counterrevolu¬
tionary activities and jailed in Mao’s China -
attended a junior high school for workers,
peasants, and soldiers in Hunan. He so
excelled that by 1978 he was eligible to study
at the National Research Institute in Beijing.
He taught himself hardware design and pro¬
gramming, then created the first and second
computers used in Chinese industry - a pay¬
roll system for a private company and a com¬
puter that controlled a Hour mill. In 1983 Yan
was given one of the two IBM PCs available
in China at that time. He created a program,
CC-DOS, or Chinese Character DOS, that
bridged the considerable gap between Micro¬
soft’s code and the Chinese character system.

After two years, Yan left the institute for a
private company, “to go swim in the sea ” as
he puts it. He was working for an electronics
firm, writing software for power plants,
when he met Wang. A year later, the two men
decided to go into business together. They
were turned down for financing by several
companies before the Stone Group - a Hong
Kong-based importer of typewriters and
Compaq PCs - funded their venture, which
they named Stone Rich Sight, or SRS. They set
up shop in an abandoned school building.

Three years before Microsoft released a
Chinese version of Windows, Wang and Yan

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developed a program called Rich Win, which
translated standard English Windows to
Chinese, so it could read and display Chinese
characters. Rich Win became essential to
Chinese PCs; eventually, 80 percent of the
PCs in China used it Though as many as
2 million copies were bootlegged, SRS sold
more than 3 million, making it the most
successful software company in China.

In 1995, Wang watched intently as the Net
exploded in the US. Though China had rela¬
tively few Net users, he saw how it could be
“China's salvation ” He began what he called
Project Surf the transformation of SRS from
a software company to an Internet company
- in spite of opposition from most of his
managers and investors. (When one of them
heard about Wang's idea, he renamed it
Project Stinky Fish.) In March 1996, SRS
released its first Net-related product, a seam¬
less upgrade called Rich Win for the Internet.
As Rich Win did for PCs, this second-genera¬
tion software made the Internet Chinese-
friendly. It did so by letting Net browsers
recognize and display Chinese characters.

It includes a cursory dictionary so a user can
click on English words on Hie Web and get
their Chinese equivalents.

Next, SRS launched a Web site called
SRSnet.com to support its software. There
was also a BBS on which, Yan says, “we
thought our users would discuss bugs and
relate technical tips. Instead, they talked
about football, gaming, and the news” The
topics ranged from current events to a dis¬
cussion started by venture capitalist Bo Feng,
who arranged a round of financing for SRS
in 1996. (See “He's Got Guanxi!” Wired 7.02,
page 122.) The topic's irresistible title? “Mod¬
em Youth and Existentialism.”

At first, the number of SRSnet users was
inevitably small - few people were online in
China - but SRS got a large percentage of
those who were connected. To make sure the
site didn't run afoul of the government and
kept growing apace, it walked a fine line of
self-censorship.

“We told users of the BBS, *Do not post
expression against Chinese law or the gov¬
ernment/ w says Yan. “If anyone posted these
contents, we deleted Lhem in order lor our
Web site to survive ”

To run the site, Wang hired Wang Yan (no
relation), who was educated in China before
earning a law degree from the Sorbonne. The

firm's flashiest dresser, he was put in charge
of expanding the site in many directions,
using the model of AOL and Yahoo! Along
with AltaVista's search engine, he put up
a slick Chinese-character search engine
designed by Wang Zhigang, Wang Zhidong's
kid brother. He also added chat rooms,
forums, news, and multimedia information
about Chinese culture - everything from
movies and music to traditional theater.

SRSnet quickly became the most popular
portal in China. In 1997, when the Chinese
soccer team played in the World Cup, SRS
Webcast in real time and got 3.1 million hits
per day in May and June - a record for any
Chinese site. But in spite of this growth, by
last year Wang Zhidong felt something was
missing. As Yan Yanchou says, “We had Lhe
best and biggest Chinese site in the world.

But our users were all in China. There was
a whole world of Chinese users who weren't
being served” Wang wondered: What about
the Taiwanese, North American, and other
Chinese communities? The link to the Chi¬
nese diaspora would turn up in a purple-
walled, single-story office building in Palo
Alto, California.

S inanefs origins fit the Silicon Valley arche¬
type: three Stanford students, a cramped
living room, and a shared, restless idealism.

Jack Hong, one of the three, was born in
Taiwan and grew up in Ohio, where his
father was a professor. His family moved hack
to Taiwan when he was 10, then returned to
Ohio when he was 15. “There was a Korean in
my 12th-grade class” Hong says. “Everyone
thought he was my brother” Though he had
never been to mainland China, he felt drawn
to his Chinese heritage, partly because he felt
like an outsider in both Taiwan and the US.

In college at the University of Texas in Hous¬
ton, he founded a hand that played Chinese
music, lie started another Chinese band
while attending graduate school at Stanford.

Studying art, product design, and mechani¬
cal engineering, Hong Lu lured on the side. One
of his students was Ben Tsiang, who came
from a prominent Taiwanese family. (Tsiang's
grandfather was Chiang Kai-shek’s chief of
Staff) Tsiang had his sights on the Harvard
Graduate School of Design. Before graduat¬
ing, Hong also met Hurst Lin, who was bom
in Taiwan and grew up in New York before
earning his Stanford MBA.

090

After Lin graduated, he worked as a finan¬
cial consultant while Hong stayed on at Stan¬
ford for his PhD, At night, he'd invite Lin
and Tsiang over, and the three would sit
around Hong's living room discussing their
futures. Deciding they would work together
in some business, they considered several.

By coincidence, Lin and Hong attended a
presentation by Jim Sha, one of Netscape's
founders, in late 1994. Sha was recruiting
for Mosaic, the Web browser company that
would become Netscape, and he gave the
audience of Stanford students a preview of
things to come. “He was showing these hock¬
ey-stick charts of the growth of the Internet,
and we thought, Tfeah, right; B Lin says.

Soon after they missed the Netscape boat,
Lin says he began to “get it.” Hong, too, got
online and into the Net's implications for
distance learning. Then Tsiang came up with
the idea of a Chinese site,

“We didn't have a competitive advantage in
education services/’ Lin says. “But we had one
in a site for and by Chinese, We were Chinese.
We knew 7 the needs of Chinese-Americans ”

The more they discussed it, the more they
became inspired, “Chinese kids in the Stales
lose their Chinese, lose touch with them roots.
1 thought the Net might he a hip place for kids
to read in Chinese, as opposed to boring
newspapers” Lin says, “Also, there was some
chauvinism thrown in: Why should the com¬
puter world be dominated by English?"

hi April 1995, they made their move. For
their company's name they rejected Great
Wall (“too trashy” says Lin) and China.com
(it didn’t include Taiwanese, Singaporean,
and other Chinese people). They setded on
Sinanet and, cou rtesy of Stanford computers,
launched. Hong used his art arid engineering
skills to create software that rendered Chinese
characters on the Web, For content, the new
pminers called Chinese embassies and con¬
sulates, both of which receive a daily newsfeed
from China’s state agency, “Sin e,” Lin admits,
some of it “was official news and propaganda.
But we had to put up something.”

Every morning at 6, one of the Sinanet
founders uploaded the news from New York
via a 14.4 modem. It took about half an hour.
If the modem disconnected, they started over.
They sought other news sources and hit
pay dirt when the second-largest Chinese-
language newspaper outside China agreed
to let Sinanet have its content tree. (The

publisher viewed it as good publicity,)

“Before us T new r s from China was always
really late - 16 hours late if you lived in San
Francisco, where there is a large Chinese pop¬
ulation and some Chinese newspapers, and as
much as three days late in other parts of the
country,” says Lin, “We were able to beat the
newspapers. We became a big hit among Chi¬
nese students everywhere" Hong says serious
news from China was the most sought after,
tbllow r ed by entertainment and cultural news.
There was also a hearty audience for tabloid
stories - grisly murders and sex scandals,
Sinanet put up chat rooms and bulletin
boards, too - “self-generated content,” says
Hong. Chinese students on college campuses
spread the word to their families, and
Sinanefs traffic steadily grew. To pay for the
site, they began selling Chinese food online.
“At least it solved our lunch problems," Hong
says, Stan Saih, the founder of Acer Com¬
puter, heard about the site and offered
operating funds and servers and computers -
which became particularly useful once Stan¬
ford kicked Sinanet otT its system.

As Sin a net’s traffic grew, the founders
settled into a real office and wooed a CEO,
Daniel Chiang, then president of Trend Micro,
an Internet virus protection and security
software company. With Chiang in charge,
the three founders took VP roles and focused
on supplying editorial content through deals
with 200 providers, beefing up the arsenal of
servers, and selling advertising to a variety
of companies interested in reaching the
Chinese-American community. But their plan
lacked something: China. And, Lin adds, “As
a bunch of badass Chinese^Americans, we
could see pretty dearly that there was no way
we co u I d parac h ute into China ”

J ust as Sin a net's trio of founders and new
CEO researched a move into China, SRS's
Wang Zhidong and Van Yanchou contemplat¬
ed a way to expand beyond China. The two
co mp antes li rs l go L t age l her whe n a pai r o f
Wang’s investors brought him to visit
Sinanet, Both sides immediately saw the
logic of a merger.

“We had a common willingness to be the
best in the world and a common willingness
to be the biggest in the world" says Van.
Wang, though, was still unconvinced. Over a
weekend in November 1998, he sequestered a
group of advisers in a conference room at the

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Having helped secure
funding in the early days,
Sma CFO and COO Daniel
Mao is preparing to take
the company public.

Dragon Club in Beijing. For 40 hours, nobody
slept. Finally convinced, Wang decided to go
forward with the merger. Sina.com was born.

In Beijing, Yan Yanchou remained head of
R&D while Wang Yan led an ad hoe team -
made up of staff from boLh companies - in an
effort to combine the sites so the look and
feel was the same whether one logged on
from the US and Europe (siaa.com), China
( sma.cam.ch\ or Taiwan (sina.comAw). Hong
Kong ( &ina.comJik ) was added later. Though
the design was now integrated, political and
cultural differences dictated that the sites
remain unique. Local editors in each coun¬
try were in charge of selecting content rele-
vant to their locale and supplementing it
with articles on local affairs. Some choices
were obvious - entertainment listings, for
example - but the Chinese and Taiwanese
editors had to make others as well, scouting
for content that wouldn't offend government
censors. The initial political caution has
given way to discussions that axe, by Chinese
standards, freewheeling. Increased usage has
brought greater freedom of expression.

in the meantime, Wang, who became chair
of Sina.com, and Chiang, Sina's vice chair,
prepared for the IPO by bringing in Silicon
Valley veterans to run the company and sit
on the board of directors. They convinced
Daniel Mao - an investment banker who
helped secure funding for SRS and had
become Wang's trusted friend and adviser -
to come aboard as COO. For CEO, they tapped

Jim Sha, the man who had given Sinanet’s
founders their first look at the Net back in
1994. Sha, wbo’d been at Oracle and Intel
before he helped Jim Clark and Marc
Andreessen found Netscape, had since retired
from “the Internet rollercoaster” and planned
to manage an investment fund. But after visits
from Chiang, Mao, and Wang, Sha joined.
“The call of China was too much to refuse”
he says. “I felt obligated”

in place of a Sha hiree. This change, plus a
switch of lead underwriters (from Goldman
Sachs to Morgan Stanley Dean Witter),
reestablished a single vision and a single
direction for Sina - Wang’s. In practical
terms, it meant that the Chinese market
would take priority over oilier Sina markets
elsewhere in Asia and the US.

Even as Sina endured its org-diart tumult
and recommitted to users in China, it contin¬
ued to unite Chinese speakers eveiywhere.
On September 30, two weeks after the boat'd
meeting where Wang shuffled the deck, and
right about the time these changes were
made pubLic, an earthquake measuring 7.6
on the Richter scale hit Taiwan, killing 2,295
people and causing b ill ions of dollars in
damage. Minutes after the tremor hit, people
in every country of the world booted up
Sina.com.

“It was as close as I could get to going
home” says Mark Yang, a Chinese-American
student whose parents live in Taipei. Once
again, the company’s servers were stress-
tested as thousands checked in to get news
- for some, news of family in Taiwan.

Sina’s founders on both sides of the Pacific
will likely strike if rich when the company
goes public. And, as Daniel Mao says, some
of the excitement they fee] undeniably comes
from being able to stop playing “the poor

Sina's September shake-up confirmed that while it
is a global company, its top priority is China.

Although, under Sha, Sina's numbers kept
improving and advertisers embraced the site
- the Sina Mail began to rack up impressive
sales - Wang disagreed with Sha's emphasis
on the non-China market ahead of the nascent,
but exploding, Chinese mar ket

Some advisers told Wang to wait until after
the IPO but others supported him when, in
September, he radically shook up the com¬
pany's leadership. “1 learned what Sina.com
needed to go forward” Wang told an associ¬
ate in San Francisco, “and felt the need to set
the company on a clear, directed course.”

Sina was already in its pre-IPO quiet
period when Wang consolidated his position
{Business Week called it “a management
purge”). Wang replaced Sha as CEO. leaving
him a small role as a company director;

Mao, meanw T hile, became CFO and COO

relation” and “level the playing field.” But
Sina's Founders say that being there for peo¬
ple like Mark Yang will always be their great¬
est reward.

“We knew that the ideological and cultural
problems were bigger than any technical
problems,” Hong says. “First Amendment?
China doesn't have a First Amendment Yet
what brings change but openness - access to
information and the ability to communicate.
It’s happening at Sina and it's all very gutsy
and exciting. IPs like a spiritual awakening ”

“Suddenly, we are no longer separated by
geography and nationality” says Wang.
“Finally we are genuinely tied together by the
Internet”! m u

David Sheff {davidsheff@yahoo.com)
reported on Sony in Wired 7J1.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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The memo from Paul Allen to Interval Research was loud and clear:
Give me less R and more D. By Thomas A, Bass

A fter seven years of blue-sky exploration, Interval
Research Corporation - the Palo Alto, California,
think tank financed by Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen
- is coming in for a landing. Open-ended research
in information technology is the only life it has ever
known, hut now the lab is leaving behind the thin air
of advanced ideas to work on creating marketable prod¬
ucts, As interval scientist Rill Lynch earnestly put it
recently, “WeTe moving from the 'Let a thousand flowers
bloom 9 stage to being more tightly focused on commer¬

cializing our technology,”
Interval's earthward trajectory
actually began some time ago,
when the information age took a
terrestrial dive of its own. In the

Paul Allen's new
direction rocked
the lab all the way
to the to Pi unseating
David liddle as CEO.

early ’90s, everyone thought the wonders of digital
broadband entertainment would beam down to us from

the heavens. This is how Star wave, Paul Allen's online
news and sports producer now owned by Infoseek, got
its name. While satellite was the belle of the ball, cable

WIRED DECEMBER 1995

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Pierre St-Hilaire (left),
head of Interval's
Holo drome project,
and colleague Chris
Kogelnik, pictured with
a panoramic digital
video camera that
captures 12 million
pixels per frame.

TV was the ugly duckling of telecommunica¬
tions, reserved for cultural bottom-Feeders
and telephone linemen. But in 1998, Allen,
for one, changed his mind* In a few short
months, lie spent more than $20 billion
buying his future flagship, Charter Commu¬
nications, and other cable compa nies.

AT&T and Time Warner quickly followed
his lead, fueling a multibillion-dollar rush
to deliver broadband via cable* In October,
Allen’s investment company, Vulcan Ven¬
tures, made another bet on cable, taking
a $1.7 billion stake in RCN, a telecom new¬
comer with Its telephone, Internet, and
TV fiber-optic cables planted firmly in the
ground. Now the fourth-largest cable opera¬
tor in the United States, Allen boasts more
than (i million subscribers, and the party is
still open to anyone with a spare $3*5 billion
“ which is what he expects to raise from a
public offering of Charter stock this year.

Freshly endowed with sister companies
and a fee-paying audience, Interval is being
summoned, after an adventuresome adoles¬
cence, to pull its weight in the family busi¬
ness. Its new mandate is surprising to some
and inevitable to others: to develop prod¬
ucts for Allen’s cable empire. Either way.

the priorities have suddenly become dear.
“Once you have a fat digital pipe into the
home,” explains Interval researcher Pierre
St-Hilaire, “you have to create value for the
people who buy your pipe.* This shift in
direction rocked tile lab all the way to the
top in mid-September, when David Lid die.
Interval’s founding director and CEO,

stepped down, leaving the top slot empty
and making room for two new copresidents,
Arati Prabhakar and Doug Solomon. In a
three-sentence statement his press office
released, Paul Allen acknowledged Interval’s
“shift in focus” from pure research to prod¬
uct development* Pie vowed to continue his
“investment” In the lab and announced that
Liddle would continue serving as chair and
adviser to the company*

The Interval team members held their
breath through project reviews in October
and are waiting to see what the “new* Inter¬

val will look like when next year’s budget
is finalized in December* Change is in the
air, and not everyone’s embracing it. Said
one researcher, “If our project gets starved,
well bail.”

The question is, Where to? The tale of
Interval’s past and its impending future goes
to the heart of the debate over the value of
pure - or at least purer than commercial -
research* “When Interval began, we just did
cool things * says Michael Naimark, a video
artist who’s worked there since 1991. “It was
100 percent research, 0 percent develop¬
ment” Interval came to be revered as per¬
haps the sole surviving link to the great
industrial research facilities of yore - the
labs at IBM, AT&T, and Xerox PARC, which
themselves have become increasingly com¬
mercial and product-driven. Liddle, a vet¬
eran of PARC, strove to take the hard
lessons of that famous institution - which
managed to foster brilliant ideas but not
profit from them - and reinvent the form.

An unusual hybrid between an industrial-
research lab and a venture capital fund,
Interval was conceived to live off the pro¬
ceeds of its ideas* According to the original
vision, this perpetual-motion machine
would be primed to sustain itself by 2002*

It would seek out commercial applications
without sacrificing creative leaps. Liddle
has described this hybrid model as “a PARC
without a Xerox.”

If you do a back-of-the-envelope calcu¬
lation of what it costs to keep a vested sci¬

entist employed in Silicon Valley - about
$200,000 a year - it would appear that
Allen’s original $100 million commitment
to Interval has doubled by now (not includ¬
ing the money he spent last year Lo buy the
Page Mill Road office complex that houses
the lab). So far, neither he nor the public
has much to show for it: some art installa¬
tions and videos, a touring tent full of com¬
puter games, a musical “stick” played by
Laurie Anderson, and five spinoff Valley
startups. Some of this stufflooks loopy, and
none of it - so far at least - has made much

For four days, the secret lab opened its doors to me.

"All these years I haven't been able to speak
to anybody," said the project leader of'Tantasma."

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

BOB

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money. It didn't help matters when, a cou¬
ple of weeks after Allen's announcement,
the game company ePlanet became the third
of the spinoffs to go belly-up,

Liddle emphatically supports the new
direction, at least in public, and we’ll proba¬
bly never know whether his original idea
would have succeeded. Refusing to specu¬
late, he says he prefers to keep his mind
focused on the future, “We’ve done enough
with games* he says. “We’ve done enough
with music. Now we’re trying broadband
and cable - where suddenly we have a
chance to get in.”

W ith 116 scientists and 54 staff mem¬
bers, InLerva] is noi the largest
research laboratory in Silicon Valley, where
both Xerox and IBM have a major presence.
But Interval has always had a special buzz
and a collection of talent that, even in the
annals of technological genius, stands out.

There’s Lee Felsenstein, moderator of the
Homebrew Computer Club, and Rob Shaw,
cocreator of chaos theory, and Max Math¬
ews, the first person to make a computer
play a tune. (Stanley Kubrick paid tribute to

this musical milestone in 2001 , when the
dying HAL breaks into song.) There’s Joy
Mountford, who designed high-speed
tactical-fighter displays for the F-16 before
heading up Apple’s GUI group. And there’s
Jim Roydcn, the distinguished-looking man
who directs the company’s audio research.
Liddle refers to Boyden as one of Interval’s
Jedi - senior research scientists who mentor

junior colleagues. There are great inventors
from PARC, Atari, and Apple, and there are
a host of younger researchers plucked from
Stanford and the MIT Media Lab. These
people are famous - at least in the Valley -
for inventing or developing key aspects of
the PC revolution. In Boy den’s case, it was
the inkjet printer.

From its founding. Interval claimed the
leadership role in designing next-generation
technology. Paul Allen had struck it rich

with Microsoft; Interval would get him up
and riding the next big wave.

The lab has also been resolutely private.
On the day it opened its doors, it dosed
them, mapping itself in a cloud of secrecy.
Even outside scientists w r ho collaborate
with Interval’s researchers typically remain
in the dark. “I’ve been visiting Interval since
it opened,” says Jim Crutchfield, a physicist

at the Santa Fc Institute who has worked
with Rob Shaw, “and I still have no idea
what it does ”

In the midst of adjusting its altitude and
direction. Interval opened its doors to me
for four days. I entered the sanctum to
discover old-style Interval projects cohabit¬
ing with a series of new schemes respond¬
ing to the needs of Allen’s other holdings,
in particular Charter Communications,
Instead of games, musical instruments,

The tale of Interval's past and its impending

future goes right to the heart of the debate

over the ilue of pure research

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llllilli.

Researchers Jenny Dana and Gavin (Wilier behind
a bench of 64 video lenses. Their aim: to build a
circular camera system for holographic television,

and location-based entertainment - arcade
games and theme parks - these projects aim
to exploit the new generation of digital tele¬
vision, interactive video, and high-speed
online connections that cable will bring to
our houses. If Americas corporate giants
are right, this is the next u wow fl technology
headed for explosive growth. With compa¬
nies like Charter pumping data into our
homes, the crude TV of today is slated to
morph into a technology capable of deliver¬
ing three-dimensional and high-definition
images. Some of the ongoing projects, such
as basic research into the human auditory
system, fall under what copresident Arad
Prabhakar calls “unbounded research” as
opposed to the “fairly standard corporate
R&D - usually D instead of R - embedded
in a cash-generating business. But we’re
moving” she says, “a couple of steps toward
the latter end of the spectrum”

Located in a complex of low-slung build¬
ings with red tile roofs on Page Mill Road,
the lab sits at the edge of the Stanford
University campus, A vine-covered trellis
arches over the front door, and the tastefully
decorated offices look out over a garden
landscaped with fountains and waterfalls.
The only visible wrinkles in this corporate

paradise are big retrofit beams that rein¬
force hallways buckled in the 1989 earth¬
quake, and a shortage of space. The latter
problem should be resolved in the next few
months, when Interval moves to a bigger
building in its office campus. (Earthquakes,
for now, are still beyond Interval’s control.)

A group of researchers invites me to join
a meeting. They are tackling two related
projects, Holodrome and Sashimi. All of
Interval’s research projects have similarly
whimsical, opaque names. Holodrome

and Sashimi are both concerned with
building cameras to help Interval fulfill
its quest to reinvent TV.

The Holodrome camera looks outward,
capturing a 360-degree panorama at such
remarkably high resolution that each part of
the image is itself nearly the equivalent of
an IIDTV image. If television this rich could
be broadcast, instead of using your zapper
to change channels, you could use it to
zoom in on the action or fly around a scene
from any angle.

Paul Allen has suggested using this tech¬
nology to broadcast theater-in-the-round.
Another application would be to build it

into one of Allen’s sports stadiums (he
owns the Portland Trail Blazers and the
Seattle Seahawks). This would allow a
viewer to focus on the action anywhere in
the stadium, thereby creating an infinite
number of crane shots and close-ups. No
longer will people be watching the ABC
version of Mon day Night Football ; they
will be making their own.

“It’s the old dream of telepresence or
virtual reality; you get transported into a
scene, which you want to be as realistic as

possible,” says Pierre St-Hilaire, the French
Canadian who leads the project, St-Hilaire,
who came to Interval from the Media Lab,
is a young man of infectious enthusiasm.

He built his camera from scratch; many of
the finer pieces were lovingly assembled
on a workbench next to his desk. “If I had
known how big a job it was going to be,

I probably never would have started,” he
says with a Gallic shrug.

The Sashimi camera looks inward. When
it’s completed, it will actually be more than
a hundred cameras, which capture an array
of images. This could lead to holographic
television, where objects appear on the

Endowed with sister companies and a fee-paying
audience, Interval is being summoned
to pull its weight in the family business.

WIRED DECEMBER 1599

IMAGE; LAURA T. 01MAFtl0

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screen in three dimensions, As you walk
“around” them - again* maneuvering via a
new kind of tapper - the sparkling diamond
rings on the Home Shopping Network will
beckon irresistibly. This camera is being
built by Gavin Miller, an English scientist
who did graphics algorithms and animation
aL Apple for eight years. Miller talks about
some of the new methods he has found for
“putting a robust vision system behind
every camera * Then, as the meeting winds
down, he cracks* “When our projects arc
finished, do you know what Pierre and l arc
going to do wiLh our two cameras? Point
them at each other and take each other's
picture”

Elsewhere, an Interval scientist named
Malcolm Slaney pads around his office
barefoot, working ou other ways to enhance
TV. Collaborating with fellow researcher
Michele Coveil* who’s also Slaney's wile,
and Christoph Bregler, now a Stanford pro¬
fessor* who arrived at Interval four years
ago as a summer intern, Slaney has worked
on audio morphing (seamlessly splicing one
sound into another), on the cocktail-party
effect (tuning in Lo a single voice in a

crowded room), and, most recently, on video
rewrite, which animates human faces in
videos and movies by driving them with
speech. With a lot of number crunching,
video rewrite can rearrange all the pixels or
dots in a moving image according to the
words a character is speaking: Roberto

Benigni’s lips* for example, could be in
synch when Life fs Beautiful is dubbed from
Italian to English. Or CBS could broadcast a
synthetic Dan Rather, a simulacrum who
reads the news 24 hours a day - even while
the real one is home in bed*

Then there's Tom Ngo, who is working on
a project called Centaur, A crisp, methodical
man, Ngo is tackling the great beast of
broadband: video-on-demand. Another Cen-
taurian, Bill Lynch, has also worked on a
new kind of video compression* Lynch's
technology has one killer application: IPs

symmetrical. As MPEG and other forms of
video compression work today, decompres¬
sion is done cheaply, on computers or
set-top boxes, but compression on a com¬
mercial scale happens in big, centralized
facilities filled with expensive machines.
What if you could do both sides of the equa¬

tion - the compression and decompression -
at home on inexpensive equipment? Lynch
says that, using just a small part of one
chip, he has cracked the problem.

O ne of the more impressive endeavors
preoccupying the Interval brainiacs
is not, at the moment, on Page Mill Road.
Down in Palo Alto's commercial district -
near Fry's Electronics, the local outlet for
everything from motherboards to Furbys -
the company converted an old house into
an Interval skunk works. The house has

The crude TV channel changer of today

is slated to morph into a zapper that lets you

fly around scenes from any angle.

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iWPOBtED

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rtjnl As Arranged by Ulua Darinii

Avia team members
(from left) Eugene
van Bergen, Keith
Crosley, and Roger
Meike show off a digital
theater component of
MediaWire, a TOO-Mbps
home network that
easily links Internet
telephony, and enter¬
tainment

been gutted to make a big room full of net¬
work analyzers, spectrum analyzers, digi¬
tizer scopes, and signal generators, each one
costing $30,000 to $50,000,

Here, a half-dozen people arc working on
a project called Fantasma, Italian for
“ghost.* Project leader Roberto Aiello, a par¬
ticle physicist from Trieste, explains that he
and his team are building a wireless home
network for connecting all our soon-to-be-
installed digital appliances, including audio,
video, TV, computer, and telephone.

Aiello begins talking, then interrupts him¬
self; “All these years I haven’t been able to
speak to anybody. How do i explain?*

He tries again. Fantasma, Aiello says,
is meant to take all the datastreams coming
into our homes through broadband cable

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

and distribute them. Aiello’s wireless net¬
work is based on transmitting data as
ultra-wideband radio signals (UWE), a kind
of digital broadcasting that uses pulses
instead of conventional radio's modulated
waves. The rapid-fire pulses, which mimic
the firing of Is and 0s in a microprocessor.

can pack tremendous amounts of infor¬
mation into their signals. Aiello knows
all about these pulses because they resem¬
ble what physicists look for in atom-smash¬
ing accelerators. On one side of the room,
a system demo runs computers that open

Q i □

files in computers along the opposite wall
and pipe music from a CD player to remote
speakers. “It’s some kind of Italian rock
music ” says Aiello. “I don’t know; it's my
wife's."

Central to building a wireless home net¬
work are the antennas that transmit and

receive its signals. In this case, Aiello’s
antennas are hidden under paper cups,

I am not at liberty to reveal the size of the
paper cups, u Tou might call them ‘a com¬
mercially interesting size,'” one researcher
suggests. Aiello kindly lifts one of these

Inside the skunk works is a high-power microwatt
home network - one illegal outside a research lab.

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cups to allow me a quick peek. Underneath,
I find an inspired example of the black art
of antenna design*

The only problem with Aiello's home net¬
work is that it's illegal to operate, at least
outside a research laboratory. (The US mili¬
tary has been using similar technology for
30 years in radar and secure forms of com¬
munication*) Aiello is broadcasting way
down in the microwatt range, which is
lower than the unintentional radiation your
TV set gives off. Bui UWB transmits in a
part of the spectrum controlled by the FCC,
so Aiello finds himself in a catch-22*

“It is OK to broadcast here by accident,
but it's not OK if it's intentional” he says,
throwing up his hands in dismay* Interval
has submitted testimony attempting to
show there's no danger of serious interfer¬
ence, and the FCC is now holding hearings
on whether it should allow civilian use of
UWB signals. Company copresident Prab-
hakar intends to push Fantasma hard. “I’m
quite bullish,* she says, “that the regulatory
struggle will be overcome.”

Eventually, if all goes according to plan
and the regulators give a green light,
Fantasma will move into “advanced devel¬
opment ” joining another five projects in
this stage back on Page Mill Road. Here,
researchers work on burnishing their
fastballs before heading out to search
for venture capital or launch themselves
as startups* A dozen people - market
researchers and business staff - coach
the scientists, helping get the best pitch
schematized into a business model*

Out the other end of this process come
Interval startups like Avio Digital. Unlike
Interval's other venlures, most of which
focused on games, Avio is directed dead
center at home broadband. Given the lab's
new mission, this should be the harbinger
of interval businesses to come.

The idea behind Avio is simple* A fabless
chip company - one that designs micro¬
processors produced in someone else's
billion-dollar factory - Avio has created a
chipset for a home network called Media-
Wire. This efficient multimedia system can
distribute all the video, audio, computer,
telephone, and other digital feeds the
“local” cable company will soon be pump¬
ing into out electronic cottages* This media
network for the home is synchronous -

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governed by one clock - making it free of
jitter and other phase problems that affect
paeketized data. The network is capacious
and cheap - and, best of a11, it runs off
telephone wire, either the stuff already
installed in the walls or a slightly belter
grade of wire, which optimizes perfor¬
mance but is still dirt cheap.

To show this broadband system in action,
Avio has Lurned its San Carlos headquarters
into a mock digital home. A television plays
video clips in the “living room ” John Lee
Hooker, at higher-than-CD quality, is thump¬
ing in the “kitchen,” while out in the “family
room” the kids are listening to Larry Mullen
and Adam Clayton's funky version of the
theme from Mission; Impossible. An intranet
built around Avio chips and some telephone

mass of people in the Netherlands, Japan,
and Korea that Avio's one-plug, one-wire
solution is the way to go.

Four of Avio's founders - Bob Hoover,
Tim Ryan, Roger Meike, and Keith Crosley
- gather in a conference room to explain
how the company got started, “We're
technogeeks” says Meike, who helped
design the International Space Station's
networking system, Tim Ryan spent a sum¬
mer building the control system in Bill
Gates' house, and Bob Hoover is a synth
geek who has built electronic music and
video systems. The fifth founder, Glenn
Edens, who invented the laptop computer
(he patented the clamshell design), is now
vice president of broadband technology
at AT&T. “I like to innovate and move on

Avio is directed dead center at home broadband.
Given the lab's new mission, this should be
a harbinger of businesses to come.

wire pumps these audio and video streams
from one room to another, while simulta¬
neously answering the telephone, down¬
loading email, and scanning the front steps
to see who’s ringing the video-equipped
doorbell.

Avio's first-generation system handles
100 megabits per second, 10 times more
than a standard corporate Ethernet. It can
connect a hundred devices over 214 miles
of wire. It has enough capacity to distribute
8 video streams, 32 higher-than-CD-quality
audio streams, 16 telephone or ISDN hues,
and 12 Mbytes of computer data. In case
you don’t rush out and buy all the new digi¬
tal goodies as soon as they hit the market,
Avio’s system is engineered with enough
adaptability to keep your old analog compo¬
nents working, too.

While not yet ready to reveal their names,
some big players in the computer industry
and in consumer electronics have signaled
their willingness to embrace Avio's technol¬
ogy. If it prevails as the standard - and this
is a big if a standard Media Wire connec¬
tor, like a telephone jack, will go into all the
new r TVs and stereos we buy, and a single
wire will carry their signals around our
homes. Avio, which hired its new president
from Philips, is trying to convince a critical

to something new” says Edens.

Avio began as an Interval project to imag¬
ine whal the digital home of the future
would look like. k 'We built a little cartoon
house nut of foam core and moved into it ”
says Hoover. “It was George Jetson’s house
of the future.”

The team drew pictures of all the inter¬
esting things they wanted in their house,
then built them out of foam core and even¬
tually created the devices themselves. “We
were surrounded by all Ihis neat stuff when
we realized something was missing,” says
Meike. “It was the enabling technology that
would pull il all together and allow the
pieces to talk to each other.

“In order for the TV to shut up when the
phone is ringing and let you know who is
calling, the TV needs to know about phone
calls. How do you get this information into
a TV set? W T eil, you connect it to the phone
cable It slowly dawned on ns that the abil¬
ity 1 to get information around to all of our
devices was the underlying problem.”

“We wanted a network so simple and fun¬
damental that it's like the power grid,” says
Hoover. "Wherever there's an outlet in the
wall, you just assume that what comes out
of it is power you can use. In the future,
wherever there's a MediaWire outlet in the

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Interval spinoff Zowie's just-released Redbeard's
Pirate Quest - a combo PC game/haptic action toy
that redefines point and shoot

wall, you will just assume that what comes
out of it is data”

Already, there are competing technolo¬
gies for wiring home networks. Systems
produced by Tut and Epigram, for example,
arc being promoted by the members of the
Home Phoneline Network Alliance. This
packet-switching approach to moving data
around the house on telephone wires is
good for sharing hies and modems, but it
runs at just 1 Mbps. The next generation
of HomcPNA, recently released, still chuffs
along at 10 Mbps - far short of what’s
required to pipe media around a house.

FireWire - or IEEE 1394, its official name
- is another kind of home network created
by Apple and embraced by Sony, which has
its own brand name for 1394 connections,
i.Link. This computer bus zips along at 400
Mbps. But IEEE 1394’s fiber-optic cable is
expensive and fragile across distances.

With outfits like Sony and IBM (the latter
is researching similar technology in a proj¬
ect called Pervasive Computing) engaged
in the battle for the home, and with a slew

of companies pushing wireless solutions,
Avio is hardly a shoo-in. But Media Wire
is doing its best to stand clear of the fray
by positioning itself as the backbone of
home media networks, with enough flexi¬
bility to run all the analog, HomePNA, IEEE
1394, and w ireless devices you might want
to attach to this backbone. The first com¬
mercial Media Wire products will appear
next year, but it will take another year or
tw T o before consumer electronics and com¬
puters are happily married and living
together in everythin g-digital households.

“This is my second Ethernet” says Liddle,
referring to his glory days 25 years ago at
Xerox PARC, where he helped develop the

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key technologies that run today's computer
networks. “Local area networks were a
new idea back then. Home media networks
are a new idea now. Without any prior
research, we've made an out-of-the-blue
invention that solves the problem from
scratch.”

Despite Liddle’s optimism, Interval must
concede that Avio is one of only two Interval
startups still standing. The other, Zowie
Intertainment, is fully rooted in Interval's
past. Zowie, which has just released its first
products, is a toy company with interesting
technology but little relevance for broad¬
band. In Redbeard's Pirate Quest , a model
pirate ship loaded with electromagnetic
sensors takes the place of the computer key¬
board. Behind it, on the screen, appear
pirate-infested waters, looming rocks, and
peaceful lagoons through which Red beard
and his cronies navigate. The view changes
as players move action figures, which are
loaded with sensors, around the deck, or
when they turn a spyglass atop the crow's
nest. The company also just released Elite's
Enchanted Garden , an electronic play space
for girls.

Zowie, it must be said, is faring better
than Interval's other startups. In two ear¬
lier attempts, both launched in November
1996, Interval spun off Carnelian, which
produced Web publishing technologies,
and Purple Moon, which made Rockett's
New School and other CD-ROM games for
girls. Although Carnelian disappeared qui¬
etly (Interval reabsorbed the technology),
Purple Moon's demise in February 1999
hit the lab like a seismic blast. (The spin¬
off was later bought out of bankruptcy by
Mattel, which plans to ship a new Rockett
product by December.)

Run by researcher and software designer
Brenda Laurel, Purple Moon aimed to cre¬
ate computer games that appealed to girls.
However, the company foundered on the
reality of what it takes to sell games to kids
in today's market. Says Interval market
researcher Bonnie Johnson, “If we had
researched business models as thoroughly
as w t c researched girls, 1 don’t think we
w r oukl have created a CD-ROM business.”

w We were really discouraged by the clos¬
ing of Purple Moon * says Bill Verpiank,
who researches human-computer inter¬
action at Interval. w It was a critical point

IMAGE: LOUIS P5IHOYOS/M ATRlX

Video map specialist Michael Naimark, pictured
with his wide-angle stereoscopic movie camera,
is migrating toward real-time 3-D webcams.

in the organization’s life r
Lid die is forthright about what Allen and
Interval have learned from their failures:
“No more music, no more games” As for
the shift to broadband, “We just blocked off
what have turned out to be some dead ends ”

I nterval's history can be divided into
three periods: In the early days, every¬
thing in Paul Allen’s wired world was open
to exploration. Then in the middle years,
the lab wern its own way and they saw less
of Allen in Silicon Valley, except when he
came down to play his guitar at the summer
picnic. Now there’s this new phase, coincid¬
ing with Allen’s push into the cable indus¬
try. “For the first lime ” Bonnie Johnson
says, “he has articulated broadly what he’d
like to hear from us”

Johnson admits that some of Interval’s
researchers are troubled by this new phase
in Allen’s life. But she thinks these qualms
will pass when people understand that

Allen is less interested in cable as it now
exists than in its expanded, broadband
form, which includes pumping “art and fun
things over the wires ” In May, she herself
told me, “I don’t like television, and \ don’t
subscribe to cable ” Since then, she has
decked out her home with cable connections
throughout.

One of the worriers is Michael Naim ark,
who got his start in the 1970s as a film¬
maker working with Nicholas Negroponte
on a filmed map financed by Darpa. If
chatted the city of Aspen, Colorado, with
such fidelity that a prospective spy, who
could steer through the map at will, would
end up knowing the city inside and out
without ever having been there. Filming
in stereo and creating immersive environ¬
ments of breathtaking verisimilitude, Nai-
mark has been making video maps ever
since. Now he wonders whether interval
still welcomes his art. In the meantime
he has chosen to switch from stereoscopic
movie cameras to webcams, a medium
better suited to the lab’s new direction.

Another researcher expresses similar
worries anonymously. “There is a social

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27.1NTER.NALAFFAIRS

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31. A NIGHT AT THE ROXBURY

32. NIGHTFALLS ON MANHATTAN

33. NELL SIMON S THE ODD COUPLE II

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are trademarks of Paramount Pictures. Star Trek"' and related marks are Irademarks ol Paramount Pictures
All Rights Reserved. The Rugrgts Mqvie"“ Viacom Infl, Inc. © 1993 by Paramount Pictures and Viacom Int'L Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Nrckelodeon. Rugrats and all iclaled titles, logos and characters are iradomarks of Viacom Int'L Inc. Rugrals created hy Arlene Klasfcy.
Gabor Csupo and Paul Berms in. Payback © 1999 icon Distribution Inc. All Rights Reserved
TM. ® £ Copyright © 1999 by Paramount Pictures. All Rights Reserved

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PARAMOUNT "BUYS, GET 1 FREE"

DVD OFFER AND HOME ENTERTAINMENT SWEEPSTAKES
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(AND YOO LL BE AUTOMATICALLY ENTERED INTO THE SWEEPSTAKES)'

{at Look for on Official Paramount DVD Mail-in Offer Form printed in
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available while supplies Fast, at participating retailers. Carefully complete
the OVD Mail-in Offer Form, cut it out, and comply with the instructions
indicated on the reverse of the form, Requests must be received
by 6/30/00. Limit one request per envelope.

— OR —

|b) On a plain piece of 3"xS" paper, hand print your complete name,
address, zip cede (or postal cade, if you live in Canada}, and your First
and second choice from among the DVD tides indicated in Column C on die
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every effort will be made to honor your second choice). Mail your request,
along with the fallowing: (I) original or copy oF register receipts) dated!
between H/31/99 and 5/31/M, indicating that you have purchased five of the
qualifying** Paramount DVD tides, three from Column A on the preceding
page and two from Column B an the preceding page, with qualifying**
purchase prices circled, {11} original UPC proofs-uf-purchase from each
DVD purchased (found on the outside of each DVD package}, and (Mil a
check or money order in the amount of U.S. $3-95 (if you five in the U S.}
or CDN 35-95 (if you live in Canada} for shipping and handling,
to: Paramount DVD Requests, P.O. Box 4340, Blair, ME 680C9 4340
All requests must be received by 6/30/00. Limit one request per envelope.

For details on how to obtain information by mail regarding
your free Paramount DVD, please call 1-BD0-B11-4817.

Allow 6-B weeks for lha delivery of your DVD.

'•Quantying purGhB&gs are Paranufitnt DVD purchases made in the correct quantities
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2, HERE’S HOWTO ENTER THE SWEEPSTAKES;

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The Grand Prize wmnar will be selected in a random drawing an or about
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contract here” he says, “We don’t make as
much money as we could working for a
startup company. Nor do we get public
recognition because our research is kept
secret* In exchange, we get to work oil stuff
really at the edge. That's why we're here.
This is a watershed moment for a lot of us.
We wonder whether the new management

understands this social contract”

David Lid die gets impatient with such
remarks. "‘It's revisionist history ” he snorts.
“The truth is tha! we've always been an
archly commercial place ” Coming from the
opposite direction, copresident Prabhakar
avers that Interval won't be entirely
cable-centered, “We’ll intentionally con¬
tinue to support some deep, long technol¬
ogy research that won’t he realized until
several years out, w

020

Researcher Lloyd Watts, for example, con¬
tinues to study the neurobiology of human
hearing, learning how the ears and brain
process sound and then implementing these
computations in hardware. In an office
humming with computers, he gives a demo
of how a little camera outfitted with “ears”
will turn toward you if you clap your hands.

Next he must get it tracking not just loud¬
ness but the frequency of a particular voice
or sound. "This is the basis for a powerful
multisens oring system, a computer that
can see me and hear me,” he says.

How can the changes at Interval best he
measured? Perhaps by watching Liddle
himself, who might be finding the place
less welcoming than before. “David has
wanted to move on for some time, ever
since it was clear that Interval was going

The name Interval refers to the space between,
dividing the old order from the world yet to be born.

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to do less research and more development"
says Bob Metcalfe. A close friend of Liddle’s,
Metcalfe worked for him at PARC, where
he invented Ethernet before leaving to
make his fortune at 3Com. “Development,*
Metcalfe says, “just wasn’t what interested
David ”

Whatever Liddle decides to do, he will
remain one of Silicon Valley's senior states¬
men. A big man at 6' 4", with a bald head
and broad forehead, silver-framed aviator
glasses, blue wide-beam eyes, and a white,
close-trimmed beard, Liddle is a forceful
writer and charismatic leader who sits on
numerous boards and sometimes teaches
at Stanford. Speaking with his hands, which
are long-lingered and quick, he cuts the
air with decisive sweeps or frames it like
a basketball player ready for a layup. In

pocket, was wondering what to do next
when he got a breakfast invitation from
Paul Allen.

“Allen and Liddle are Viking buddies ”
says Interval scientist Bill Verplank, who
also worked on the Star. The observation
echoes a theme. Allen calls the company
that directs his investments Vulcan Ven¬
tures, after the Roman god of fire. An early
suggestion for the research center's name
was Valhalla, but someone pointed out
that this was where slain Norse heroes
went to fight their battles in perpetuity.
They then settled on the name Interval,
referring to Lhe space between, or the
interregnum, dividing the old order from
the new world yet to be born - a process
Allen and Liddle originally thought would
take a decade. To bridge this interval, Allen

"There was never a falling-out," says Liddle friend
Bob Metcalfe."Development just

wasn't what interested David."

fact, Liddle briefly played basketball at the
University of Michigan, and If he had been
a couple of inches taller, he says, he would
have stuck with sports instead of going on
to graduate school in computer science at
the University of Toledo, “Of course, by
now Pd be selling insurance somewhere*
he jokes.

Liddle joined PARC in 1972, Soon he was
running the Systems Development Division,
formed to sell the Star, Xerox’s first com¬
mercial workstation. Xerox introduced the
first GUI with icons, the desktop metaphor,
dialog boxes, object-oriented programming,
the laser printer, and the Ethernet LAN -
all the great inventions that made Apple,
Microsoft, Adobe, 3Com, and other com-
petitors fabulously wealthy. Why Xerox let
its technology walk out the door is a long
story. Suffice it to say that, for Liddle, the
experience left a lasting impression; at
Interval, things would be done differently.

In 1982, Liddle joined the exodus from
PARC and, with Don Massaro, his former
boss, founded Metaphor Computer. They
made a workstation like the Star but faster,
aud sold a lot of machines and software
until IBM bought them out in 1991 for $122
million. Jiddle, with some money in his

planned to fund the lab for a decade. The
years 1992 to 2002 were even printed on
company name-tags. Today, the end date
has been removed.

Joining forces in ’91, Allen and Liddle
began staffing Interval with an all-star team
of Silicon Valley players. It was kiddie’s
inspiration to organize Interval’s brainpower
around projects, with everyone expected to
work on two or three of them at once. Today,
researchers are still scattered throughout
the building randomly, and everyone is
encouraged to work together. This is accom¬
plished by dividing time into points and
giving everyone 20 to spend. A project will
be budgeted for so many points, and a pro¬
ject leader will recruit fellow researchers
by signing up teammates for primary
(14 points), secondary (6 points), or lesser
(3 points) commitments. “If we took our
signal-computation people and put them
all together, they’d start making 10 percent
improvements in things* says Liddle.

“But if we match them one at a time with
a mechanical engineer and a videographer,
they'll do great new things *

Borrowing his organizational model
from God, Liddle started Interval with seven
projects. When it grew bigger, he grouped

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these projects into seven “areas ” Bonnie
Johnson, his third hire, describes the found¬
ing: “We spent most of our days in meetings
thinking about what we would do, and then
one day David said, There shall be seven.’”

“When Interval grew to over a hundred
researchers, David took the seven gray-
haired staffers and said, Te shall be area
chairs/” adds Johnson, who is one of these
chairs (although she is blond). Interval’s
seven fields of research, currently scattered
throughout areas codenamed Alpha, Bravo,
Charlie, and so on, included computer
graphics and image processing, new com¬
puter design, signal processing, audio
research and wearable computing, human-
computer interaction, market research, and
electronic assembly in Interval’s shops.

T hat was then. And now?

It did not go unnoticed that in
Paul Allen’s terse announcement of the
shift in direction, there were no words
of praise or support for his old friend. No
thanks for years of loyal service. “It’s a
golden-parachute statement, a classic
phaseout” says a Silicon Valley press agent
with long experience in reading corporate
tea leaves.

Whatever happens to their relationship,
.Allen’s commitment to Interval appears, if
anything, to be stronger than before. Tt’s an
increasingly important part of our portfo¬
lio ” says Bill Savoy, president of Alien’s
Vulcan Ventures. “Now that we have to find
the breakthrough technologies that will
make cable valuable to consumers, a lot
of what Interval is doing could be a huge
windfall for us ”

Metcalfe, for one, agrees: “As Paul’s empire
grows, the leverage of the Interval brain trust
only increases. This is an extremely valuable
asset David has given his friend

To complement its researchers, the lab
is beefing up its business team. Prabhakar’s
copresident, Doug Solomon, joined interval
in October 1998 as VP of development.

In a 15-year career at Apple, Solomon had
moved from managing educational products
- such as Logo, an early programming lan¬
guage for children - to directing strategic
planning. His assignment at interval is to
assemble a team of MBAs and bundle the
lab’s ideas into startup companies and ship-
pa ble products.

Working directly with Allen’s companies
on joint projects, or giving his cable sub¬
scribers first dibs on Interval technology,

Allen planned to fund the lab for a decade:

"1992 to 2002" was printed on company name-tags.
Today, the end date has been removed.

Liddle insists that giving up daily opera¬
tion of the lab signals nothing about his
longtime friendship with Allen. “Every rela¬
tionship has its ups and downs” he says.
“We’re not alienated.”

For his part, Allen chose not to comment
on the state of the friendship (or on the
future of Interval), but perhaps Bob Metcalfe
describes it best: “There was never a falling-
out between Paul and David - although,
on second thought, maybe a failing-out is
exactly what it is, in the literal sense of
falling out of step. Paul wants to go one
way, David another”

“This may be the end of the golden age
at Interval,” says a friend of Liddle’s. “But
David is an incredibly loyal and persistent
guy who will stick with them through the
transition.”

the lab is supposed to feed its ideas, inven¬
tions, and breakthroughs into our homes
across the Paul Alien universe. Does
this make Charter Communications the
Xerox that lid die promised would never
interfere with his PARC? Is Interval slip¬
ping into the kind of corporate research
driven by a parent business and its quar¬
terly reports?

Perhaps not. Perhaps Interval, steering
a trickier course, will pull off a cultural
coup: Amid the Valley’s knee-deep capital
and high-speed innovation, it will manage
la fly high with its feet on the ground. ■ ■ ■

Thomas A. Bass (tbass@hamilton.edu) is
a frequent contributor to Wired. His latest
book , The Predictors, is about using physics
to forecast trends in. world financial markets.

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Plenty of digital cameras look like
conventional single-lens reflex shooters,
but Olympus' C-250QL actually operates
like one. This model uses mirrored
optics to let you view exactly what
the electronic sensor sees, while its
2.5-megapixel sensitivity rivals old-
fashioned film. C-250QL: $1,499.
Oiympus: (800) 622 6372, +1 (516)

844 5000, www.ofympus.com .

As the name suggests, the CyberToof is
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Victorinox/Swiss Army: (800) 243 4045,

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A gaming device that brings skiing,
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Can't find your way? Once you calibrate
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WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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You've got sweet desktop speakers and a boomin'
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Are you ready to rock and roll? D-Box's Odyssee, a
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tracks tailored to specific films. The long wait
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TrackMan is the Hummer of the GPS world: bulky,
costly, and peerlessly powerful. With a compass,
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your footsteps constantly, even underground,
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it radios your position to a receiver at home base,
TrackMan: $3,000. Point Research: +1 (714) 557

The world's slimmest and lightest mini DV camera,
this Sharp further features a 1QX optical zoom and
a swiveling LCD that shows what you're shooting at
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AST: (877) 278 2661, www.astcom.

Prop designer Greg Benke kludged a lo-fi
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The Cub Cadet snow thrower's exclusive
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Now it's easy to get to the far comers of your imagination. A place where your most outrageous ideas come
alive. Where creativity and business objectives actually merge. Begin your journey with an unexpected transport
device. Samsung monitors. Yes, Samsung. We r re the #1 manufacturer of CRT and TFT displays in the world.

With technology that lets you travel to new visual landscapes. We have the credentials and the awards to prove
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The Power of Samsung™

Newbies will appreciate these specially
designed snowshoes of lightweight
polyethylene, with simple bindings
instead of straps and a unique beaver-
tall design* Now you can tramp through
the snow without walking like a robot.
5WX926 S no Walker: $69*95.

OuttaBounds (877) 766 9255,+1 (97B)
256 8372, www.snowaikers. com.

A triumph of design for design's sake,
this 13-inch TV, housed in an ice-blue
cabinet, is pretty enough to complement
any kitchen or bedroom. Bonus: a wake-
up alarm that sounds like a rooster's
crow - though Green Acres this ain't.
13PT30L; $249. Philips Electronics: (800)

531 0039, www, philips usa.com ,

The Bottoms Up doorbell announces
your guests'arrival with the sound
of wineglasses clinking. The chime has
the added benefit of making skinflint
dinner guests feel guilty that they didn't
bring along a bottle. Bottoms Up: $175.
ATYS:+1 (415) 441 9220,
www.atys-incxom ,

Living Water II adds UV sterilization to
the water purification process, killing
yeasts and viruses other filters might
miss. Running on solar or battery power,
it can process up to half a ga llon per
minute, using filtration, ozonation, and
UV radiation. Buy one for every member
of the household if you're the type that
hates sharing your glass* Living Water II:
$500. Alpine Industries: (B00) 9B9 2299,
www. a ip ineindus tries, c om .

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

YOUR

WILL SO

THEY TOOK MUCH LONGER

Why should your M P3 files sound like the low-bandwidth versions? Monsoon's flat panel
speakers deliver surprising clarity, while the powered subwoofer gives rich bottom end to CD
audio, DVDs, 3D PC games and MP3s. That's why Monsoon MM-1000 speakers were awarded
five stars-the highest rating-by MP3.com. Order MM-1000, MM-700 or MH-500 series
speakers, starting at just $99.95, at 877-722-8346 toll free, or visit www.monsoonpower.com,

This ceiling light fixture
references computer interfaces
of the 1950s, which used bulbs
to signal that certain logic gates
were functioning: Two small
orange lamps show that the
12-volt transformer is working
and that current is flowing into
the system, {Of course, you
could simply check that you're
no longer in the dark.) 1994
lamp: $1,800. Limn:+1 (415)

543 5466, wwwJimn.com.

WIRED DECEMBER ^ 999

Ski smart with Freestyle's 820
Altimeter, which calculates your
rate of descent as you whiz
down the slope. Use the watch's
record bank to compare today's
vertical attack with your
previous adventures: check the
barometric pressure; or flick on
the blue LCD after dark, 820
Altimeter. $200. Freestyle USA:
{800} 949 1563,+1 (805)388
1001 r www.freestyieusa.com.

Your music wilt really blow with
Yamaha's wind MIDI controller,
which plays like a saxophone
but produces the sound of
almost any instrument. Its wind
and lip sensors pick up your
phrasings (or lack thereof), and
it can transpose songs to any
key for easy fingering. WX5
White: $799.95. Yamaha: (800)
854 1569,+1 (714)522 9011,
www.yomoha. com.

A truly refined sound machine,
M a ra ntz's Ta b letop Musi c
System will nevertheless make
you feel like you're operating a
backhoe - you run the CD
player and radio with small
chrome gearshifts, A motorized
cover slides open to reveal the
disc spinner. The system comes
complete with satellite speakers
and a subwoofer. Tab letop
Music System MR-2020: $999.99.
Marantr+1 (630)307 3100,
wmv r marantzamerko.com.

Few other tiny computers
match the Libretto 1100
Supersfim's power, with its
Pentium 266 processor, 3.2-gig
drive, and 56K modem. Plus this
thin slice, available in Japan and
from US importer Dynamism,
has a detachable camera in its
hinge. Libretto 1100 Superslfm;
$2,495. Toshiba: fax+81 (3)

5444 9327, www.toshibo.co.jp ,
Resold in the US by Dynamism:
(800)711 6277,+1 £312) 953
4479, www.dynamism.com,

: 4i

tuesday, 11:15 p.m.
bought him a new tie

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A min (flashlight with maxi-illumination, the
eternaLight uses a microprocessor and four LEDs
to generate a bright glow that would last almost a
whole month if you left it running. Ideal for night
trekking, the lamp also features a setting that
flashes an SOS alert, perfect for the dozen or so
people who still know Morse code. eternaLight:
$79,99. Technology Associates: (877) 832 4277,

+1 (775) 322 6875, www.techassxom>

Put a little water in its jug and the handheld Hot
Shot steamer deans everything from sofas to
motorcycles. Since it's environmentally friendly,
you won't have to scrub down the planet after
you're done. Eraviro Steamer Hot Shot: $80. Eureka:
(800) 282 2886, +1 (309) 828 2367, www.eurekaxom ,

Tour players never carry their own dubs - and
you won't have to either with the Dynamis, a
remote-controlled motorized caddy. This battery-
rechargeable looper may not be smart enough to
recommend a wedge over a 9-iron, but it will zoom
your bag up Cardiac Hill and back. And it won't zing
you for a tip, Dynamis: $999. Sun Mountain Sports:
(877) 406 9303, +1 (406) 7SG 9131,
www.dynamiscaddy. com ,

Swim with the fishes in the Exosuit Swimmable
ADS, a cross between a drysuit and a one-person
submersible.Thls atmospheric diving suit has a
fiber shell with oxygen and gas cylinders, a wireless
communication system, and sensory feedback
manipulators for hands. Designed by diving master
Phil Nuytten,the self-contained aqua suit lets you
dive down 600 feet. Exosuit Swimmable ADS:
$100,000. Nuytco Research: +1 (604) 980 6262, fax
+1 (604) 980 6236, wwwMuytco.com *

Nuytco

Heseard

WIRED DECEMBER 1999 0 5□

High Speed Industrial's sunglasses look cool and
work even cooler.The polarized polycarbonate
lenses provide UV protection and wrap around your
face to provide maximum peripheral vision Jet-A
Goggles: $80. High Speed Industrial: +1 (415) 51 2
8081, www.hsidesignxom.

Logitech's SoundMan X2 subwoofer and satellite
speakers put some punch into your sound files with
40 watts of power and a speaker drive designed
to widen audio spectrum response, providing a
big sound in the small space on your desktop,
SoundMan X2: $99.95. Logitech: (800) 231 7717,
www.Iogitech.com.

A true underwater hot rod, the Hydrospeeder
can cruise along at speeds of up to 6.9 mph. Its
integrated buoyancy and breathing system can
take you down to 100 feet for at least an hour.

Your body hydrodynamtcally comp fetes the form
of the speeder, while foot pedals let you adjust your
speed and make turns* KID Hydrospeeder: $12,000.
T&T Leasing: (800) 764 9996, +1 {954) 967 1142,
www, hydrospeeder f com *

Give your PDA the protection it yearns for with
the Bumper.The tough cover acts as a sort of
sport jacket for your Palm, ensuring it won't get
damaged at the bottom of your pack - or thrown
out of a fancy restaurant. Bumper: $39.99* Concept
Kitchen: (BBS) 611 7327, +1 (415) 348 9999,
www. con cep tkitchen .com ,

□ID WE MENTION
YOU’LL FEEL CONNECTED
TO THE ROAD?

[ALERO.COM]

Visit our Web site, and find out how the Active Response
System can turn a roomy sedan into an exhilarating drive

Olds mobile.

1-877-ALE RO-4U

ACT has made a PC gaming pistol that
even Commander Tebok would be proud
to use. The Romulan disrupter-shaped
weapon for PC gamers offers a shot
accuracy down to 3 pixels to meet all
your antisocial needs, GS Gun System:
$99.99. ACT Labs: (800} 930 9997,

+1 (604) 278 3650, www.act-hbs.com.

The iMac of sushiware, this set includes
frosted Plexiglas see-through chopsticks,
a chop stick rest, and a 3-inch acrylic
sushi block that lends an ethereal quality
to your meal. Plus, it doesn't need
upgrades and never crashes. Sushi Set:
$400 Girth Design: +1 (718) 389 1281,
www.girthdesign, cam ,

After goosing the performance of hard
drives a few years back, magneto-resistive
heads have finally debuted in the first
removable storage medium, the ORB, The
drive fits 2.2 Gbytes onto its own small
disks, and talks at a blazing 12.2 Mbps
to your Mac or PC, providing fast, cheap
storage. ORB 2.2 GB: $199.95. Castle wood
Systems: +t (925) 461 5500, www
xastfewoodxom>

British designer Julian Brown wants to
turn your mild-mannered office supplies
into wild animals. He's already designed
a tape dispenser that looks like an
elephant; now he's uncaged a stapler
that looks like a crocodile. Flick the lever
on the unit's head, and it ejects the
staple magazine, Isis: $68. Counterpoint:
(838) 545 5073,+1 (915) 545 5073,
www. counterpoint 1. com.

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

EJ & □

Will it endure?

Start-ups come and go (and that is
W their purpose). The smaller companies
often fall prey to the same fate. When
looking for a career, it T s often wise to
find a place that you know will endure.
Not just for a month. Or a year. Or
even for your tenure at the company.

You want to pick a place that will exist
far beyond your days. Why? Because
those are companies that have, at their
core, an idea that is timeless-and
an influence that is profound.

This is our ninth decade on the planet.
Join us, and make your ideas the
historic ones of Decade Ten.

yvww. ibm. com/whywork

A.SSvi"

srasn

1,Flex Time

A wafer-thin 3 millimeters, E ink's roliable display takes
in store signage to the next level. Updated through a
wireless Internet connection every 10 seconds and lit by
charged microcapsules, the 6-fooMall sign pictured can
be viewed from any angle - and it consumes less energy
than a lightbulb, Immedia sign; made to order, $50-5,000,
E Ink; +] (617) 868 8088, www.eink.com .

2, Box Office Bandwidth

This refrigerator-sized digital projector, used for selected
screenings of The Phantom Menace, offers a preview of
the filmless future. Far exceeding the picture quality
shown at your local theater, the ILA-12K tan project onto
screens with up to 2,000x1,280 resolution from as far
away as 360 feet - noiselessly. Input any video standard,
HDTV, or workstation graphics, and splash your [mages
on the side of a building or even a curtain of water. Sure
to make you a big hit with the neighbors. J LA-12K:

$185,000, Hugh e s -J VC:+1 (760) 929 5300, w w w hjtcom.

3, Profiler

You don't have to sacrifice picture quality for a slim
profile - this 50-inch-diagonal plasma screen is less
than 4 inches deep and pumps out XGA resolution.
Bonus; It s one of the few displays this size able to show
true HDTV. PDP-502MX: $19,995. Pioneer: (800) 926 4329,
+1 (310) 952 2111, www.pioneerusa.com.

Screen-Age

displays that will change the way you see

From giant walls of moving images to eyepieces smaller than a dime, the
surfaces on which we display information are more varied, more colorful, and
clearer than ever. You say you want a resolution? Here's a freeze-frame of
the best screens around.

The Bigger

Designers of limited edition frames for sunglasses and prescription eyewear

/- a. E ye works

Face: Jodie Foster. Frame: Chops by l.a.Eycworks. Hair: Victor Vidal. Cloutier. Make-up: Kara Yoshunote, Celestine. Styling: Deborah Waknin, Gelestine.
Photographer: Greg Gorman. ©1999, l.a Eyeworks, La.Eyeworks, Los Angeles and South Coast Plaza, Costa Mesa. 1-800343-3337. www.1aeyeworks.com

Desktop Re

tionaries

1. Letterbox

The sleek, translucent exterior and letterbox-size screen
make the Apple Cinema Display an Ideal aesthetic match
for that speedy G4. Practically speaking, the 22-inch-
diagonal flat panel Is scaled to handle large magazine
layouts and to cut down on toggle time. The cinematic
proportions also mean you can watch and edit high-def
digital films In wide-screen. Apple Cinema Display with
Power Mac G4: $6,498. Apple: (800J 538 9696, +1 (408)
996 1010, www.appte.com.

2. Sunny Delight

Thanks to a filter that cuts out half the reflected light,
Sharp's! 3.3-Inch screen has practically no glare and
provides one of the crispest XGA pictures (1,024x768) the
LCD pioneer has produced yet. Actlus ASQQ: $3,000. Sharp:
(800) 237 4277,+1 (201) 529 H200.www.sharp-usa.com.

3.Fla1tery

Finally, a desktop display that gives your superb, high-end
graphic work its due. This 17-inch CRT monitor features
the world's flattest tuhe - with absolutely no curvature -
producing a razor-sharp image and max resolution of
1,600x1,200. SyncMaster 700IFT: $419. Samsung: (800)
726 7864, +1 (201) 229 4000, www.samsunp.com,

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

060

One is right for you, but which one?

As you may know, our reputation stems from our
research into new technologies for better sound
reproduction. This research has resulted in many
products for almost every application.

Which product is right for you depends upon
your listening habits and environment. A selection
made without considering these factors too often
results in spending more than necessary or getting
less than desired.

How can you decide? Call us. Our consultants
will recommend the best product for your particu¬
lar needs and budget. We can send you literature

and direct you to one of our thousands of dealers
worldwide who is closest to you and who carries that
particular product. Once you hear it, then you can
decide if it's just right for you.

Call toll-free: 1-800-ASK-BOSE (1-800-275-2673)
Ask for Ext. 526.

Visit our store at the Gardens of Palm Beach,

Palm Beach, FL

Visit us on the web at ask.bose.com/ca526

There's only one thing

you need to know about

— the

*vl999 Sapient fcorpgrgtion

www, s.apie-nt. com

nternet economy.

Us.

Since 1994 [practically a century in Internet years), Sapient has been helping businesses
thrive in the new economy. We were the first to combine aLL the skills you need to compete
in the ever-changing world of the Internet—strategy, web technology, brand and experience
design, systems integration, user research and more. Which means we can gel you there
rapidty and reliably, while it's still relevant. We know a lot about Ihe Internet economy
To prosper there, alt you need to know is us. Sapient. Architects for the New Economy: '

The Take-Away

1. DriviiV Theater

Cries of "Are we there yet?" making it hard to keep your
eyes on the road? Slap an Alpine G.5-mth monitor In
your car's seat-back headrests and a OVD player in the
dash. Cranking out Dolby Digital Surround Sound,
the system's antiskip design is engineered to ride out
the bumps between bathroom stops. Alpine Mobile
DVD Theater System: $3,200. In-dash monitor: $1,300*
Alpine: (8GQ) 257 4631, www.Qlpmehcom.

2. Touch and Go

The cordless phone of computing, the Linux-based
Qubit stays connected with its cradle via a 2.4*GHz
radio link, so you can go from room to room and never
lose your Netstream. Away from the keyboard, the
device relies on a 800x600 touchscreen display* Qubit:
$350, Qubit Technology:+1 (303) 864 0767
www.qu bit. net, in fod qubit net.

3. Wanderlust

Surlt to walk the walk and then some. Fujitsu's
freestanding touchscreen tablet measures 8*4 Inches
diagonally and just over an inch thick; the underside
is fitted with finger-friendly velvet Running Windows
98, the Stylistic lets you write reports and log onto
the Net via a wireless keyboard or the tap of a pen.
Stylistic LT: $3,265. Fujitsu: (800) 831 3T83 # +1 (408)

982 9500, www.spsi.fujitsuxQm.

□ 6 0

With our search engine on your site, you don'l
need some diabolical scheme to make money.

Sure, having an evil plan is nice, but devising a formula for higher
profits is pure genius. With GoTo.com Web search on your site,
you'll get paid every time someone searches. You can also create
additional banner inventory to sell. And best of all, earning money
with GoTo.com will cost you absolutely nothing. Already, there are
over 100,000 locations on the Web that have discovered our formula
for success. Find out how you can too at www.goto.com/getsearch.

101999 GoTb.com, Inc.

Search made simpler

REW FF

STOP PLAY/PAUSE

LIGHT

ECEMBER 1999

Digital

Close-

1*Contact lens

With a viewer just bigger than a pencil eraser, IBM
Japan s wearable PC prototype puts you eye to eye
with the minutest details, IBM is testing two tiny
heads-up display chipsets (see right half of the unit
above), one made by Colorado MIcroDisplay, the
other made by Kopin. Colorado's directs 800x600
color Images to your retina via a prism - crisp enough
to watch movies or peruse secret documents on the
sly. Wearable PC prototype: unavailable. IBM Japan:
www.ibmxojp'C MD8X6D SVGA Microdisplay Chipset
Evaluation Kit: $5,000. Colorado MieroDEsplay:
www.comkroxQm.

2. 555 SURF

Nokia's dual-band handset sports one of the largest cell
screens available, all the better to cruise data services and
read email on the road. Bad news, Matrix fans: Though
it's a dead ringer for the Nokia prop used in the movie,
this baby won't let you jump between dimensions. 7160:
$500 (available first half of 2000). Nokia: (888) 665 4228,
www„peopIewii!talk com.

S.Mimples

First developed at Mil, the Kopin display on this digital
camcorder is about the size of a fingernail but packs a
fistful of image capability, equal to a TV with 320x240
resolution. The CyberCam itself weighs less than a pound
and holds 30 minutes of video. GR-DV3 Digital CyberCam:
$1,099.95 JVC: (800) 526 5308, www.jvcamerkaxom.

it's your boss's first day back from hair-plug surgery.

They last longer than ordinary Duracell in digital cameras.

Pricezsa

NLWYOIKEI

THE FILM SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER PRESENTS

THE NEW YORKER

GOES TO THE MOVIES

NOVEMBER 30-DECEMBER 9

THE (VI

WALTER READE THEATER

165 WEST 65TH STREET BETWEEN B'WAY&AMSTERDAM
NEW YDRK CITY

The New Yorker proudly presents its first-ever film festival.

Celebrating 75 years in "reel time," this dynamic series spotlights the relationship between
one magazine and the movies. The marquee features films based on New Yorker stories,
written by New Yorker writers, or made famous by New Yorker reviews.

LA5T TANG0 IN PARIS

TRADE WINDS

CRIES AND WHISPERS

A whale 1 ntta Brando & a hit of Maria Schneider in Bertolucci's
Parisian folie a deux. Thursday December 2 at 1 :DD k G;G0

Fredric March and Joan Bennett trade wisecracks at sea.

Friday December 3 at 1:00, 6:00 & 10:00

Bergman's death dreamscape in red and white, about three
sisters in a country house. Sunday December 5 at 7:00

IN COLD BLOOD

HORSE FEATHERS

MY SISTER EILEEN

Robert Blake k Scott Wilson as Perry k Dick, the thrill-kill
murderers of Truman Capote s non-fiction novel.

Wednesday December8 at 2:30 &6:45

Graucho as a college president: the password is swordfish."
Tuesday November 30 at 4:00

Musical version of Ruth McKenney s stories of life in

Greenwich Village, choreographed by Bob Fosse.

Saturday December 4at 6:45

BANANAS

MIDNIGHT

SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY

Vintage early Woody, posing as a revolutionary in a
fictional Latin American country.

Wednesday December 1 at 3:00 k 7:45

Claudette Colbert crashes french society as a fake
countess and attracts the eye of cab driver Don Amethe,

Friday December! ai 3:00&8:00

Murray Head loves both Glenda lacksnn & Peter Finch

In this London-set love triangle.

Thursday December 9 at 1:D0& 6:00

MILLION DOLLAR LEGS

THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER

THE LEFT-HANDED WOMAN

Homegrown surrealist farce starring W.C f ields and

Jack Qakie, Wednesday December 1 at 1.00,6:00 k 3:45

An Alexander WonlkoLMype played by Monty Woolley
takes over a midwestern household.

Tuesday December? at 1:00 k 6:00

Peter Handke's adaptation ol his own novella, with Edna
□ever as an Austrian woman 'finding herself' in Pans.

Sunday December 5 at 4:30 k 9:00

MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS

THE MALE ANIMAL

CASUALTIES OF WAR

Turn of the century St Louis in blazing technicolor,
with Judy Garland and "The Trolley Song.'

Saturday December 4 at 4:30 k 8:45

A comedy of communism k college football with Henry Fonda
as a professor battling for career^ wife Olivia de Haviflani
Tuesday December 7 at 3:15 & 10:15

Soldiers rape and murder a young Vietnamese woman
in this harrowing, visceral Brian De Palma film.

Thursday December 9 at 3:30 k 3:30

MONKEY BUSINESS

THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE

L. A. STORY

The Marx Brothers pretend they're Maurice Chevalier in this
shipboard comedy, Tuesday November 30 at 2:00

War hero Audie Murphy in John Huston s adaptation of
Stephen Crane's classic. Wednesday December 8 at

1:00,5:15 k 9:30

Steve Martin s satirical valentine to L.A. — watch for the
coffee ordering scene. Thursday December 2 at 3:30 & 6:30
and Tuesday December 7 at 8:15

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WIRED Presents

the HOPE auction

Helping Others Plug-In Everywhere

This unprecedented event is sponsored by:

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Browse and bid on the most spectacular
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H.O.P.E. Auction*

From December 6-8 p 1999, log on to
www.hopeauction2K.com where

you can hid on state-of-the-art technology,
commemorative millennial items and col¬
lector's pieces, including the premiere
issue of Wired. Bidding ends at 9pm PST on
Dec. 8th.

All auction proceeds will benefit WORLD
[World Links for Development at
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of information technology.

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19 9 9

3.Private Show

Sony's top-of-the-line laptop boasts a Pentium III running at 500 MHz
m and holds up to 256 megs of RAM. But its feature of features Is the
° snap-on privacy shield - a security-glass cover that hides screen
° contents from overly curious neighbors. Vaio PCG-XG9: $3,499. Privacy
Filter: $249. Sony: (800) 222 7669, +1 (408) 955 650D r www.sony.com.

2.Speak and Spell

Look under the hood of the NP-10G0 phone, made by NeoPoint, and
you'll find a slimmed-down PDA. The 11 -line (!) screen Is designed
to handle any hand he Id -friendly Web site or e-service; you enter data
via the phone's 10-key pad. And forget trying to remember numbers:
The 1,000-record memory has room enough for ail your bigwigs and
go-tos. Sprint PCS Phone NP-1000: $399.99. Sprint: www.sprintpcsxom.

1.Don't Screw Around

The Zyliss makes opening a bottle of wine as smooth as a mature
Bordeaux 1st growth. The 11 factor: a hardened steel blade that neatly
disposes of the foil capsule before popping the cork. Zyliss Corkscrew:
$22. Zyliss: (BBS) 794 7623, +1 (949) 858 5005, fax +1 (949) 858 1825,
mvwjylissusaxom*

YOU’VE CONQUERED
THE WORLDWIDE WEB,
NOW MASTER THE UNIVERSE.

* rk.

AUTOSTAP

pOLRR SV5 TEl(T
I SRTURH _ 1

MEADE

ENTEflC MOOE; OOTQ^Hp

y c.

Meade

ETX-90EC

Astro Teloscope.

Sbown with

Autostar

Computer

Controlier.

COMPUTER CONTROL.

Take a guided tour of
the heavens at the
push of^a button with
the Meade ETX-90EC
Astro Telescope.

See more in 20 minutes than Galileo saw
in a lifetime. Galaxies, nebulae, star clusters,
the planets, and more. New JVfeade digital
technology makes finding any object in the
sky as easy as pushing a button!

Choose from over 14,000 celestial
objects stored in the Autostar™ hand
controller^ database, press GO TO, and the
telescope moves to the object, places it in the field
of view, and follows it across the sky —
automatically, first time, every time. This is one telescope
you have to see — and use — to believe.

Use the telescope's automatic guided tour feature to explore the rings of Saturn,
mountain ranges on the Moon, or dust Janes in the Andromeda Galaxy. The Meade
ETX-90EC Astro Telescope with Autostar Computer Controller — easy to use by anyone,
anywhere, anytime.

MEADE

Call I-800-62-MEADE for a free copy of Meade Telescope
Catalog £1 70 or for a dealer location near you. ETX-9QEC. $595,
complete with 4-speed electronic hand controller (not shown).
#497 Aurostar Computer Controller: $149. Meade telescopes and

accessories are available at over 3000 Meade dealer locations in
the USA. and Canada Meade Instruments Corporation,
6001 Oak Canyon, Irvrne, California 92618. FAX: (949}
451-1460. www.meade,com © 1999

I-800-5 2-FOCUS

natural

wonders 8

1-800-2-wonder

Learninesmith

rtf lEViFiii, 1 z dbi raiCJii rumuji u:hd

1-800-227-2137

The

Nature

COMPANY

1-800-367-6178

[-800-938-0333

3.PDA Plus

The Visor handheld is as easy to use as
the Palm (it has the same OS) and even
easier to love, thanks to its Game Boy¬
like snap-in cartridge system, which
supports dozens of plug-ins delivering
business apps,games, and other special
powers. Case in point: Innogear's stereo
MP3 module, MiniJam [the component
with purple buttons below). Visor:

$179, Handspring: (650) 566 8100,
wwwMandspringxom, MiniJam: $200,
available early 2000, In nog ear: +1 [408)
848 8338, www.innogearxom ,

4.Scant Scan
No bigger than a hardcover book, the
13-pound NEC PetiScan isn't simply the
world's smallest flatbed color scanner,
it's also one of the most versatile. Its USB
interface lets you connect to any iMac,
G3, or Windows 98 machine. PetiScan:

$180. NEC: +81 (4) 65 85 2424, fax +81
(4) 65 85 2434, www.petiican.com.

2. Wireless Takeoff
The AirPort Base Station keeps your
Apple laptop jacked in but cord-free -
and this wireless LAN lets multiple users
put a single Net connection to different
uses. Install an AirPort card beneath your
keyboard and start exchanging data at -
that's right! - 11 Mbps. AirPort card and
Base Station: $398. Appie: [800) 538
9696,+1 (408) 996 1010, WwWMppfe.com.

1-Double Talk
True, this slim, curvy number comes
in several umbrella-drink colors, but at
root the Swatch Twinphone is pure no-
nonsense practicality: The base of the
phone doubles as a second handset.
Swatch Twinphone: $40. Swatch Telecom:
(800) 879 2824,+1 (201)271 1400,
www.swatch.com.

IMAGE 2 lHUUTER FREEM AN/COURTES* APPLE COMPUTER

Aeron® Chair.. .The Ultimate Work Tool

3, Halo Effect

Sony's MDR-DS5000 10-ounce wireless headphones take listening
” to the next level by playing 5,1 channels of Dolby Digital Surround,
It's like wearing a home theater system on your head, but without
2 the whiplash, MDR-DS5000: $549.99. Sony: [800) 222 7669,

^ tvmv.se/, sony, com.

2.Bad to the Bone

Simply put, Patagonia's hella-coot Inferno kicks Gore-Tex's ass. The
shell repels water with a breathable hydrophobic polymer, while the
recycled pile lining wicks away moisture and sweat.The manufacturer
recommends wearing your skivvies (or simply your skin) underneath
for maximum efficiency, inferno Jacket: $285. Patagonia: + 1 (805) 643
8616, (800) 638 6464, www.patagonia.com.

1. Cutting Edge

The lightweight Kyotop chef's knife from Kyocera cuts with precision
and balance. But that's not all! Because the blade is made of ceramic
zirconium carbide - fired at 1,000 degrees Celsius for 12 hours - It
never needs sharpening. [Bonus: You can fish bagels out of the toaster
without electrocuting yourself.) KC-200: $199.95. Kyocera: [800) 537
0294, www.kyocera.com ,

Take Pi ctures.Furthe

For more information visit one of the TetaiTers listed below ot visit www.kodak.com/go/dc290i

Programmability made simple

Get complete control over camew functions, from customizing
exposure and color balance to e-mailing pictures right from the
camera or dropping pictures directly into Web page*.

Smarter picture storage

The KODAK Picture Card holds significantly more high-res
pictures than floppy dish. It downloads faster too. You spend
less time managing pictures, and more time working with them.

Focus

USB connectivity for lightning-fast downloading that ’s
10 times faster than serial connections—it V a must-
have for working with larger high-resolution pictures

The DC290 can he customized to tell you which shots to take in
which order. It's a must for businesses that rely fin pictures for
documentation , like insurance agencies and construction firms.

Kodak introduces an intelligent class of digital cameras*

Looking foT a way to be more productive? Effective? Fun? Consider our new DC290 Zoom Digital Camera. Beyond
its uncanny intelligence, the DC290 offers performance that can only be called, well, eye-opening. Like razor-fine
2.1 megapixel resolution-enough detail for striking 8" x 10' 1 pictures. Or 3,3 megapixel Ultra resolution for even
sharper pictures. And burst, audio and time-lapse abilities make it even more valuable for business. The DC290
Zoom Digital Camera. Intelligence, power, speed—and Kodak's proven eye for color.

RiTZ

CAMERA

CENTERS

Jurassic Mark

With easy-to-use bindings for stiff little fingers, these snowshoes for small kids make winter hiking a monstrously
good time. And the 7-rex tracks help raise the heart rate of people walking behind youl’TRex Snowshoes: $39.95.
VubaShoes Sport Snowshoes: (800) 598 98 22, +1 (916) 920 5339; www.yubashoes.com.

DinoJfee^HotWneej^Cj
Band other cool kid gear.

L IB

et bing to play m

rve computers r-J 2

Nothing takes the doom out of doomsday like this computer-free,
special edition of Trivial Pursuit: It comes in a commemorative tin with 3,600
general knowledge questions, 100 color photocards and zero gigabytes.

You Can't Make This Stuff Up.

If the computers are still working, check out www.trivialpursuit.com

I.Turti On the AC

Watch the mind of Nikola Tesla,
inventor of the first alternating
current electrical system, come
sparking and crackling to life.
Though the Tesla coil generates
up to 50,000 spectacular volts,
it discharges only very low - and
therefore harmless - current.
Hold a wire up dose and you'll
be struck by a mini bolt of
lightning. Point the device at a
fluorescent lamp, and behold -
you get light. Tesla Coil: $239.95.
Edmund Scientific: (800) 728
6999, +1 (609) 547 3488,
wwwstien tificsonlirse. com.

2»Deep See
Explore the mysteries of
the deep with this versatile
4X telescope. You can use
the lens to capture distant
views on land, or attach the
water-resistant Sea-Scope
and focus on tide pools, lakes,
and streams. A flashlight
attachment and built-in ruler
let you see through murky
waters and measure specimens
on the spot. Sea-Scope: $14.95.
Educational insights: (800) 933
3277,(310) 884 2000,
www.edin.com.

3,Spark Station

A kid computer for a fast crowd,
the Hot Wheels PC is decked
out with the iconic flame logo
emblazoned on every junior
speed demon's dream car.
Under the hood is a 333-MHz
Intel Celeron chip and a hard
drive packed with youngster-
friendly software titles. Start
your engines. Hot Wheels PC
$599, Patriot Computers; (888)
850 5437, -1 (416) 969 8123,
www.h otwheelspc. com .

4, Peel Out

Now you can burn rubber
without burning batteries.
Pumping the Road Ripper's
tank full of compressed air
powers a single piston and tiny
crankshaft that spins the car s
wheels. Air Hogs Road Ripper:
$39.99, Spin Master Toys: (800)
622 8339,+1 (416) 364 6002,
www.spinmauerxotn.

5.Mission to Mars

Unde Milton Industries has
teamed up with NASA's Jet
Propulsion Lab to create this
shimmering, futuristic dome,
4 feet high and complete
with a dock mg/escape hatch,
an antenna, and storage
compartments for overnig ht
space-age gear, HM4 Terra ■
Colony Habitation Module:
$65.99, Uncle Milton: (800)
869 7555,+1 (818) 707 0800,
www. undemiiton. com .

080

Your mom just bought
a portable CD player.
It's time to move on.

01 Livin It UP
52 World Uud# hwk

Sons Softie
m Uhm Worlds foikd*

sjrjpmv. *w'rm

Introducing the RCA

Make your own CD-quality mixes by downloading music
files and CD tracks from your PC, It's digital Skip Free™
memory music to go. So you J re not just keeping up with
the times, you're keeping one step ahead of Mom,

LYR3"

PERSONAL DIGITAL PLAYER

www. lyrazoTve.com

CTV

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WIRED DECEMBER 1599

Read it online instead. You’ve got an important meeting tomorrow morning,
which means that you could use a little insight, a great quote or relevant statistic tonight.
Get what you need and get it now. Log on
and read [or skim] hundreds of the top business books online.

Which means you can instantly get to the point and get on with your business.

Right from your computer. Right now.

I.Dot'Com Jr*

The perfect faunchpad for
a junior achiever, this desk's
shelves can accommodate a
large PC monitor, a full-size
computer, and a laser printer,
while leaving room for software
manuals, Ideal for taking your
kindergarten public.Computer
Desk: SI 75.Wild Zoo: (888) 543
8588, +1 (541} 388 2443,
www. wMzoo.com,

2-Star duality

Reach for the stars with
this double-threat tabletop
planetarium. Indoors, the
5-Inch sky dome projects stars
on your ceiling and labels the
constellations. Outdoors, it
works as an astronomical chart,
helping you train your sights
on the real thing. Star Gazer
Planetarium: $39.95. Educational
Insights: (800) 933 3277,+1
{310) 384 2000, www.edin.com.

3.Rain Raver

With a removable flashlight
built into its handle, the Splash
Flash umbrella illuminates
even the darkest stormy night.
Bonus: Eight glowing tips
around the edge make this
must-have gear for twilight
puddle jumpers. Splash Flash:
$9.99.Totes: +1 (513) 682 6200,
w w w, sptos/i ffa $h xom.

4,Snap Pop

The JamC@m is a rugged
digicam designed for goofing
around. Snap a picture of your
dad, upload it to your computer,
paint a wig on his head, laugh
like crazy. At 640 by 480 pixels,
the JamC^m is about half the
resolution of a high-end Mavica,
but just right for the screen.
JamC^m 2,0: $89. KB Gear
Interactive: (800) 926 3066,41
(612) 941 1905, wwwAbgear. com .

S.BuginaRug

Tuck this innocent-looking
little listening device under the
sofa in the living room, then
sneak off to the study with the
handheld receiver. You can hear
what's going on from up to 90
feet away, and this bug even
works through walls. But keep
in mind that its chirping sounds
might lip off your target that
something strange is afoot
Bug 'Em: $19.99. GirlTech: (800)
8549551,+! (415) 256 1510,
www.girltech.com.

WIRED DECEMBER i y 9 y

www.netLibrary.com

and get instant access to the business insight you need.
So you can get on with being the best at your business.
eBooks online. Available 24/7

nStjubrary

Siuart Crainer

GET TO THE GOOD PART.

Flipper Than Thou (Australia)

Being digital is a disadvantage when it comes to bodysurfing, which is why Pod handboards streamline
your primate fingers into a smooth cetacean edge. Strap the acrylic aquatic appendages to your wrists
and catch the wave. Pod handboard: SA74.95 (US$48.50). Pod: +61 (2} 9650 1242,

\****** vmw*vw **v**w**v*'i*w* W \
v-ttf rV« *++*w** W*4 V<

% if 41 m»* **• * nnvwiNV 1 (Nhg;g-

\|i» v * f « M ■ +4 4 H*ft^#** #* *» ¥* r :

GLOBAL

TOOLS

You have to go there to get it.

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

SONY

Chance the way you see the world

Shoot it.

Cyber-shot ' 505 Digital Still Camera 2.1 Mega Pixels - Carl Zeiss* lens * 5x Optical Zoom Memory Stick'" The next generation of digital image, video and audio

STORAGE. It CAN EASILY INTERFACE WITH A POTENTIALLY ENDLESS ARRAY OF PRODUCTS 1 . UP TO 64 MB Of STORAGE 2 . DIGITAL, POWERFUL AND TRANSPORTABLE. CY-BERFkAME" DISPLAYS MPEG
MOVIES, AUDIO AND PHOTOS IN SLIDE SHOW MODE * COLOR LCD DISPLAY DIGITAL PHOTO PRINTER PHOTO-QUALITY PRINTS ■ PRINT DIRECTLY FROM CAMERA,
TO ORDER A VIDEO BROCHURE ON ALL &ONY DlClTAL CAMERA PRODUCTS, CALL 1-800-295-0693, £4.95 FOR SHIPPING AND HANDLING, (MC, VISA, AMEX ACCEPTED.) WWW.5QNY.COM/lKAGE

Sony Digital Imaging. Change the way you see the world:*

Digital Potoul Transportable."

1999 Sony Electrons me. A&l fiptas ressrMfflt. RAprQfluchc.ni ici citiale ar pan wishout wrrtien permission is prontoled. Simulate) picture Sorry. Cyber-shot Memory Sllci Digital Powerful, Tmsportahla. CyberFtameanfl
CtoiW toe mynusee si w vtwtf in trade marts d Sony. Carl Zeisa is a trademark erf Carl Zeiss 'Currently Sony is ittgatsatinft licensing eonlracts v-Hli many compaws 64 MS waMabla In tall 1999.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

4.PortaGril! (Belgium)

When you really want to pack it away at a picnic,
take along Cam ping az's Party Grill. The graceful,
injection-molded aluminum camp stove works
as either a grill or an oven, and collapses into a
compact package. Party Grill: BF37.66 ($40),
CampEngaz +33 U) 533 27 251 t www
.cofeman-eur.com.

3.Small Change (Norway)

The cute electric City Car is the brainchild of THINK,
Ford's fjord enterprise. Charge up the NiCad battery
and the plastic-body, steel - and aluminum-frame
mmicar will run for more than 50 miles at up to 55
mph. Under 10 feet long, the two-seater can park
where most gas-powered autosauruses dare not
tread. City Car: NKrl 39,000 ($17,688); batteries not
Included. THINK: +47 (8) 154 4415, www. fhM.no*

2. Hot Investment (UK)

Plug two inside-pocket battery packs into the Chill
Master Waistcoat and you'll stay toasty for hours.
The stretchable, conductive polymer fabric heats up
without wires, and because its electrical resistance
rises with the temperature, you'll never get too hot.
Chill Master Waistcoat with recharger and batteries:
£ 130 ($212). D. C. Heat: +44 (1506) 494966, fax +44
(1506) 497148.

[.Parallel Processor (Sooth Korea)

Too busy pointing and clicking to pick up the phone?
Mouse Phone combines a fully functioning dialer
and a directional device into one handy bundle.
Mouse Phone: W20,476 ($17).C. C. Corporation:

+82 (2) 431 8760, fax +82 (2) 431 7311 f
c32230@umteLcQ.kr.

HJ24573: So, what are you like?

BP664/8:

ltd24573:
RPG647B:

HJ24573:

I'm 6 foot 2, blue eyes, a
model, and I can play a com¬
plete Mozart concerto with
one finger,

Veah t right.

Ok, actually I haue green
eyes. But I really can play
jazz, classical and pop
fauorites with one ringer

lit) huh, sure. See ya.

If you think you’re swift with a computer keyboard,
just wait until you see what you can do with the
Disklavier* GranTouch™ keyboard, Because one
linger really is all you need to
perform a complete symphony
or top ten hit.

Only Yamaha could make
playing the piano as easy as point and press; the
elegant Disklavier GranTouch piano features
Smart Key‘"an intelligent system that actually shows

Not everything

YOU HEAR IN A
CHAT ROOM IS A UE.

you how to play melodies. Then it
A backs you with professional piano
accompaniment or even a full orches¬
tra. All you have to do is follow along as the key*
board prompts you with the next key:

However, if you prefer listening to playing, the
Disklavier is a better place to turn than your favorite
MF3 site. That's because this piano doesn't just play
music, it recreates actual live performances by great
musicians, right down to the moving keys and pedals.

Forsake the internet for a minute and team
piano on a Disklavier GranTouch. You’ll enjoy your-
self immensely. And that's no lie, To find out more
about this versatile instrument, key your browser
into yamaha.com/pianos.htm or call (300)711-0745
ext,462 for literature.

©YAMAHA

disklavier 1

GrartTouch

LBox Set (Finland)

Time Satli's translucent coffee table keeps
your television out of sight but not out
of mind The set springs into full view
when you're ready to watch, or just turn
it on and let It flicker mysteriously. Jack
in the Box: Fmk25,000 ($4,411 KTimo
Sail!: +358 (40) 523 4099.

2*Etjrftthrash (Germany)

Skaters In Europe have a new way to
hit the road - the kick board, which
combines a low, skateboard-style deck
with a shock-absorbing scooter grip and
oversize wheels, providing a smoother
ride as it rips a cross the cob blest ones.
Pro Kick Kickboard DM499 ($267). K2:
+49 (89) 8 00 84 126, www.kickboard.de.

3.Local Broadcast (Japan)

Now 20 years old, the venerable Sony
Walkman finally cuts the umbilical cord.
Just pop the neo-retro WM-WEG1 's
phones in your ears, drop the wireless
player into a backpack, slip the remote
on your lapel, and hit the button. In RF-
noisy environments, the sound may be
less than perfect, but it's great for the
gym. WM-WEG1: ¥17,000 ($162). Sony:
www. wortd.sony.com/walkman.

4* Phone of Silence (Israel)

By flooding mobile phone frequencies
with call-jamming countersignals, the
C-Guard 100 silences all 300-MHz or
1,900-MHz wireless devices within a
260-foot radius. The FCC outlaws the cell¬
phone blocker in the US, but the Israeli
Knesset uses it to maintain peace during
sessions. Or at least quiet. C-Guard 100:
1511,785 ($2,773). Netline Communications:
+972 (3) 510 9855, www.netHne.co.ii.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

Q90

Bangkok
^ Chicago

Hong Kong

lorejaf*™* London

Los Angeles
i«0™t New York City

k«@ne* P aris

p&m

<;=in Frsnn^fO

Paper?

Or Plastic.

Now you can really travel light and still carry a load ot information. That's because CltySync™ PDA Travel Guides from Concept
Kitchen 11 combine trusted Lonely Planet" travel content with the convenience and portability of your favorite handheld organizer.

From San Francisco to Sydney, first time and frequent visitors alike can unlock a city's hidden treasures. Instantly access the best
restaurant, hotel, and entertainment reviews, as well as search and sort on popular attractions, and activities. With CitySync in hand,
you can find your way with detailed city maps, and take personal travel notes to chronicle your journeys.

So, the next time you're traveling - for business or pleasure - lighten your load with Lonely Planet
CitySync PDA Travel Guides from Concept Kitchen, For more information or to place your order, go to
wwwxonceptkitchen.com or call 1-BOO-611-PDAS x333. COttGGptKitch&H

Copyright © 1999 Concept Kitchen. Ail rights resa-vsd. CitySync is a Trademark and the Concept Kitchen logo is a registered trademark at Concept Kitclm*. AH other trademarks are 11 k properly o< their respective owners.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

4.Bench Impress (Singapore)

Designer Patrick Chia's bench/lamp captures
the fluid tension of a giant paint drip frozen in
a high-speed photograph. The halogen light,
perched on a flexible stem, sways alluringly when
pushed. (This just in: New York's Totem now carries
Chia's far-out creations.) m-bench: $3,450. Patrick
Ch ia: lnfo@squeezedes ign< com . Totem: +■1 (212) 92 5
5506, www.totemdesignxom.

3. Skim the Surface (Sweden)

Part trampoline, part hydrofoil, the Trampofoil
converts your up-and-down bouncing into aquatic
locomotion. The big hydrofoil wing in back lifts and
drives you forward, while the little one in front lets
you steer. Stop bouncing and you'll sink gently for
a refreshing and well-earned rest.Trampofoil At:
Skr9,300 ($1,132}. Trampofoil: +46 (8) 556 155 50,
wwwsrampofoitee.

2.Wearever (Sweden) 1.Boogie Lights (Japan)

Swedish designer Thomas Hakansson's cyborg Plug the BMQ2 between your headphones and

accents help keep your PDAs, cell phones, MP3 portable stereo and beat mania's colorful lights

players, and other on-the-go gear close at hand. blink wildly to the tempo of your tunes, a visual

His Mobility Collection ranges from a jacket with confirmation that you're rockin', beat mania BM02:
pockets for electronic gadgets to the Velcro Wrap ¥3,565 ($34). Sakamoto Stationery Co.: +81 (3) 3876

Around that latches onto your leg or arm to carry 1331, www.sakamoto-bunguxo.jp.

a cell phone securely, Sold byTelias Mobite!,the
largest cellular provider in Sweden. Mobility Wrap
Around: 5krl69 ($21 KTelias Mobitel: www
jef:itmobitei,com>

INTRODUCING BLUE F ROM AMERICAN EXP RESS _ _ __

THE NEW CREDIT CARD EQUIPPED WITH A SMART CHIP j NO ANNUAL FEE GO TO americanexpress.com

STUNNING
LOOKS
AND i

BRAINS

TOO

Built For Your Tastes.

The right sandwich, the right computer ... Everyone hungers for something made-to-order.
But in the PC world, it can be hard to Find the ideal mix of performance, features and price.
Hewlett-Packard, however, has a way to satisfy your appetite for individuality. You can have
home computing your way by using our build-to-order kiosk at your nearest retailer or by
shopping online at www.hpshopping.com. It's the easy way to get the HP Pavilion 8500
Series PC that best fits your personal computing style. So go ahead, order extra cheese or
no mayo, because this isn’t just a PC, it’s a custom-built HP.

pentium®,_.

You can configure your HP Pavilion 8500 Series PC to your exact specifications, with the
Intel® Pentium® III processor, through custom kiosks at major retailers.

So now, more than ever, the HP Pavilion 8500 Series is the right PC For you.

1-800-PCHOME-1

It's an HP,

^ I Available At: ^

hpshopping.com • Circuit City * Staples - Best Buy

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To the letter.

Everyone thought A1 Gore and the Valley were a natural match.

Think acrain.

By Karen Breslau

John Doerr hears lots of goofy pitches. An
elaborate defense perimeter - voicemail,
pager, email, personal assistant - shields him
from having to respond to most of them. But
one day, while Doerr was hiking in Colorado,
a caller got through with a low-cost internet-
access idea, lie wanted to know what Doerr
would make of a wireless, hand-cranked
device that would let people in the remotest
regions of the earth - say, the Sahara - log
on for free. Not the sort of thing a superstar
venture capitalist spends a lot of lime think¬
ing about, but this idea got Doerr’s attention.
“Why not?” he recalls thinking. “I mean,
imagine! That knocked me out of my chair”
A1 Gore was on the line.

8 E ft

WIRED DECEM

19 99

IMAGE; LOU BCAtH (PHOTO: AP/WIDE WORLD PHOTOSf

Doerr resorts to this story not once, but
twice, to make a point: Why can’t people
see A1 Gore the way he does? How can they
not recognize that behind the stodgy facade
there’s a dreamer who believes in the trans¬
formative power of technology?

“What could be boring about a candidate
who says, Tve been using the Palm VII, and
here’s what works and here’s what doesn’t,’
and then goes to ‘What’s the right policy to
get broad, ubiquitous, wireless service for
our country?’” asks Doerr. Then he breath¬
lessly answers his own question, “That’s
anything other than boring. That’s exciting”
John Doerr, the golden prince of Kleiner
Perkins Caufield & Byers, Silicon Valley’s
preeminent venture capital firm, is pretty
good at picking winners. But talk to him
about Gore and you realize there’s some¬
thing else: Doerr is a salesman. He believes
in his product. By the time he’s done with
bis pitch, you, too, will want to invest in the
45th vice president of the United States.
“People might call him stiff, they might

call him geeky, they might call him
abstract” Doerr concedes. The market
risk is not insignificant. “But the funda¬
mentals of this man are solid. He’s really
smart. He’s well trained for the job. If I
was going to back an entrepreneur for a
risky venture, the first thing Fd do is pick
a ruthlessly intellectual, honest leader
who listens weU and is decisive.”

A! Gore has come to California roughly
once a month for the last six and half years.
He’s met countless times with Doerr, with
Internet industiy leaders including Net¬
scape’s Marc Andreessen, Halsey Minor of
CNET, YahooPs Jerry Yang, and Kim Polese
of Marimba, with biotech executives like
Genentech CEO Arthur Levinson. He’s visited
some companies, including Cisco Systems
and CNET, so often he might as well have
his own key to the men’s room. To say Gore
“gets h” is like saying Bill Bradley knows
how to play basketball.

Which makes it all the more awkward
that the product, after years of beta-testing,

launched and promptly hit the skids. Doerr’s
hero started to falter awkwardly even before
the competition swept in. Now, as the 2000
campaign accelerates, the political benefits
from Gore’s hundreds of hours of face time
with the geeks are anything but obvious.

By traditional standards, Gore should have
branded the Valley by now. Instead, he finds
himself in a scramble for market share
with the rest of the pack. They are all here:
Bradley, George W. Bush, John McCain,
Steve Forbes, and an overeager herd of
congressional candidates, most with a tin
cup in one hand and an ode to the brash
young captains of the new economy in
the other.

In many ways, Gore confronts the classic
first mover’s nightmare. He courted the geeks
long before it was politically fashionable or

Karen Breslau (breslau@wired.com),

News week’s former White House correspon¬
dent, covers the politics of the new economy
from Silicon Valley

“People might call him

stiff,

they might call him LJ

No, he didn't invent the Internet, but Gore insists,"! believe I was the
only person in public life who said publicly, 'Hey, look, this has the
potential to be a national information superhighway? " From left; The
veep checking his email; lending a hand at a Concord, California, high
school on NetDay; assembling a PC at an IBM plant; logging on from
Air Force Two ; throwing the switch at the 50tb anniversary of EMIAC.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

IMAGES FROM tEFT: DAVID N. &EftKW|T£/5IPA„ OFFICIAL WHITE HOUSE PHOTOGRAPH

PHOTOS; REUTERS/STEVE FALK/ARCH1VE PHOTOS;
OFFICIAL WHITE HOUSE PHOTOGRAPH

profitable; now he must find a way lo distin¬
guish himself as fast followers swarm his
once pristine domain. “If Gore takes the posi¬
tion of being a technovisionary, he paints
himself into a corner,” says Microsoft's on-
leave CTO Nathan Myhrvold. “He either
seems "Me too! 1 or, if he tries to take credit
for being interested in the past, you get
T invented the Internet’”

AJ Gore, digital drip. It wasn't supposed
to be this way; Gore was supposed to per¬
sonify the digital future for all .Americans.
Yet it is Bradley who took the lead in har¬
nessing the Internet as an effective tool for
campaign fund-raising and grassroots acti¬
vism. And it is Bush who can claim to be the
first candidate to post the name of each and
every campaign donor on his Web site. And
Bush who came up with the industry-pleasing
agenda: pledging to Sift visa limits on high
tech immigrant workers, support the three-
year ban on ecommerce taxation, loosen
export restrictions on high-performance
computers and encryption software, and

further push securities-litigation reform.

Do err says he is not bothered by the
buzz surrounding the other candidates.

He has, after all, made a name for himself
by being ahead of the market. He does not
worry that there is no A1 Gore fever upon
the land. Certainly, there was none at the
Gore fund-raiser I attended in Los Altos
Hilts, at the home of real estate developer
George Marcus. This event, organized
by members of the Technology Network -
aka TechNet, a bipartisan coalition devoted
to building political bridges between DC
and the Valley - brought together several
hundred guests from the upper reaches of
local tech and real estate. Just after dusk,
with cocktails flowing, Gore stood on a
tennis court, working his way through his
stump speech in the faint Tennessee drawl
he summons for such occasions: “Fm not
gonna talk about what’s on my mind, Fm
gonna tell you what's on my heart ” The
story about his grandson born on the Fourth
of July landed Hat with the thirtysomelhings

in black. He trundled on, through the mov¬
ing tribute to his mother and father - the
latter a longtime senator and a leading vice
presidential contender in 1956 - and then
on again, to a long-winded story about dis¬
covering the evils of racism in Tennessee.
He wound up with an anecdote about his
odd encounter with Stephen Hawking, a
promise to “radically reform” the American
education system, and praise for the Inter¬
net entrepreneurs who’ve powered the
new golden age. The audience clapped duti¬
fully, and Tipper was dispatched to play
bongos with Mickey Hart and the Flying
Other Brothers. There was no stampede
in Gore's direction, and so he reached out,
inquiring earnestly about the newest star¬
tups and soliciting advice about his cam¬
paign Web site. At times he stood alone
watching the band. At one point, Grateful
Dead alum Bob Weir invited him onstage
to rock out with Tipper.

“They're here to see you” Gore demurred
with a laugh. “Not me"

they might call him

abstract.

But the fundamentals of

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

Hi □

you believed the techno-utopian
prophecies after the 199b campaign
(and Wired did), John Doerr and the Valley’s
rich, powerful Democratic activists were
going to remake politics for the next millen¬
nium. Nearly three years ago, when Doerr
helped organize a high tech cluster of Valley
leaders into TechNet, he spoke of “digital
citizens” whose bright ideas would llourish
in a landscape blighted by an obsolete and
corrupt political culture. Somewhat schis-
matically, given Tech Net’s ostensible bipar¬
tisan status, Doerr suggested that A1 Gore
would be the horse they rode in on; the
visionaries of the new economy would unite
with Gore to reform the education system
and eventually whip government into a sLale
of efficient, networked modernity.

The prophets decreed that politics as we
know it would yield to a postpolitical age in
which the principles of the new economy -
information based, networked, decentral¬
ized - would be applied to social problems
that partisan hacks and their partisan dog¬
mas bad failed to solve, “We fed in some
ways like we’re reviving America WebTV
founder Steve Perlman gushed after a 1997
meeting with Gore,

With his supple grasp of technology,

Gore would become community leader of
the Digital Nation, A1 would be to the Net
what John F, Kennedy had been to television
in I960 - the star of a new medium that
would in turn supercharge his campaign.
From Gore’s perspective, the current rush
for the geeks’ political favor must be truly
frustrating; He’s done his part, learning
more about technology than most politicians
ever will and coming forth with a roster of
serious ideas that contain the ideal mix of
vision and pragmatism. By the courtly code
of the Senate cloakroom, which served as
Gore’s path to power, such an investment
would include an unspoken assumption of
payback. But for the Valley’s newest ruling
class, there is no such political culture of
give-and-take. Power comes just as often
from creating new domains as from solici¬
tously navigating old ones. Gore may well
wish that loyalty were less a commodity
and more a virtue. And the Valley may wish
-indeed, Doerr may wish - that A1 Gore

would muster a little of Rill Clinton’s fire.

To watch Gore make the industry rounds
is not a pretty sight. Ilis problem keeping up
with Bradley is the least of it. Even though
Clinton won big in 1992 and again in 1996,
the Valley is traditionally GOP turf, especi¬
ally among CEOs. And the Republicans are
in a frenzy about George W, Bush, His can¬
didacy is mobilizing old lions who’ve been
waiting eight years for a winner, as w T eIl as
a new generation of GOP-minded politicos.
At a Palo Alto fund-raising breakfast for
Bush this summer, organizers had to turn
away a horde of check-waving last-minute
arrivals. By September, at a luncheon fund¬
raiser in Redwood City, they were smart
enough to have ordered up extra tables.

Although Bush’s record on high tech
issues is not extensive, he’s making all the
right noises in a region with a broad liber¬
tarian streak. Gore’s supporters predictably
dismiss Bush’s positions as ep an during, but
“W” has assembled an all-star roster of
industry supporters, including Jim Barks¬
dale, John Chambers, Gordon Moore, and
Charles Schwab.

“Republicans in these parts have been
waiting a long time to back a winner,” says
Floyd Kvamme, the senior Kleiner Perkins
partner who is helping organize Lhe Bush
effort in the Valley. “Now we finally have
one.” (Kleiner Perkins has emerged as the
presidential candidates’ fund-raising portal
for 2000. Doerr and another K-P partner,
Brook Byers, back Gore; Kvamme organizes
for Bush; and another partner, Ted Schlein,
is raising funds for Bradley.)

According to the nonpartisan Center for
Responsive Politics, Bradley ouiraised Gore
in the Valley $405,100 to $226,525 in the
first half of 1999, and edged Bush, who
hauled in $369,918. By the third quarter,
Bradley had pulled ahead of Gore nation¬
wide: $6,7 million to $6.5 million, prompt¬
ing Tennessee A1 to move his “underdog”
campaign to Nashville. Dollars do not neces¬
sarily convert to votes or political viability -
not at this stage of a presidential campaign
- but early cash flow r is a useful barometer
of activist sentiment, and the indicators for
Gore are, to put it mildly, not good.

What’s the problem? When 1 ask Bradley

at a San Jose mix-and-mingle why he, not
Gore, should claim the digital mantle, he
seems amused to he called on his chutzpah.
His speaker’s rosLrum is decked with a large
blue-and-white “BillBradIey.com” placard,
Bradley sounds like a home shopping net¬
work announcer as he intones ‘“That’s Bill
Bradley dot com” no fewer than three times
during his speech.

“There are lots of people who know more
about technology than I do,” Bradley tells
me. “Bui it’s not just about the technology.

I have a sense of the interaction of technology,
venture capital, and education and mentor¬
ing that have combined to create the new
economy” Indeed. Bradley used a recent
sabbatical at Stanford to drill deep into the
Valley’s VC community for financial support.

John McCain, the Arizona senator and
GOP presidential candidate - who is also
chair of lhe Senate Commerce Committee,
where many Internet-re luted matters are
legislated - argues that Gore’s woes are inter¬
twined with the Democrats’ mixed record
on technology issues. Gore is losing his early
advantage among the geeks, McCain told me
during a Northern California campaign
swing, because he “gets torn” by competing
allegiances to other constituencies, such as
trial lawyers and labor unions. Both groups
oppose cherished goals of the lech lobby -
tort reform and increased visa quotas for high
tech immigrants respectively - and both are
major contributors to Gore’s campaign.

As for the tech lobby, the Clinton admin¬
istration only belatedly supported congres¬
sional initiatives on securities-litigation
reform, Y2K liability" limits, and an increase
in the HiB visa cap. Gore’s aides hem and
haw and suggest in unattributabie ways that
their man was not thrilled with Clinton’s
foot-dragging but that he must stand by his
boss’s record. And though the administra¬
tion recently relented and liberalized export
policy for encryption software - after years
of trying to reconcile the national-security
establishment’s concerns with the industry’s
commercial needs - Gore may pay the
incumbent’s price for that delay as well.

McCain has put his finger oil part of Gore’s
problem. But the core issue is even more
basic: There is no new politics - at least

Doerr recalls.

“We all just

geeked out.”

Bi H

WIRED DECEMBER 1995

Tech leaders

not yet. If Gore has failed Lhe Valley by not
generating enough heat, the Valley has
failed him in not delivering passion for
his political agenda. These days, some of
the geeks Gore presumed would help galva¬
nize his cause appear bored with the game
already. Others are behaving suspiciously
like old-school lobbyists - writing checks
not to reshape the future but Lo build the
industry's clout in Washington.

Tech leaders arc also, in mainstream poli¬
tical terms, cheapskates. Although the lure
of tremendous lucre in the Valley beckons,
there's still truth to the industry's reputation
for “deep pockets and short anus" During
the 1998 elections, Tech Net members
donated about $3 million to congressional
candidates. The group estimates that during
the 2009 campaign, its members* contribu¬
tions to presidential and congressional can¬
didates will double to about $7 million. If
that sounds impressive, consider that the
Outback Steakliouse restaurant chain has
given 50 percent more than TechNet mem¬
bers Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, Intel, and
National Semiconductor combined.

Rut that doesn't keep the politicians from
coming.

‘‘It's not the revenue - IPs the upside”
observes Wade Randlett, the Democratic
political consultant who, with Docrr, helped
establish TechNet in 1997. ‘The politicians
say, "Who's my future, who's my past?' Being

smart people, they say, "Gee, would I rather
be lined up with a dying industry - say, orga¬
nized labor - or a growing one, the technol¬
ogy sector and the online community?'”

The candidates should take notice, Hand¬
led adds. “We are aligning a community that’s
growing at 9 percent a month. Which of our
competitors has any kind of upside like that?”

Randletl's calculations are a far cry from
the lofty rhetoric surrounding TechNet at its
founding. “We are creating something that's
a new political form," Doerr told an inter¬
viewer at the time. “IPs not a PAG, IPs not
a trade association. What it will be is a net¬
work of individuals and enterprises con¬
cerned about education and about making
the new 7 economy go "

Even then, it must he said, not everyone
put such high gloss on the group. The Repub¬
licans, most notably, made more mundane
noises. Jim Barksdale, whom Doerr recruited
first as CEO of Netscape and then again as
TechNct's first Republican spokesperson, says
he foresaw a CEO-centric outfit that w r ould
simply apply “all conventional means” to
advance its political and commercial goals.

“1 probably expected Washington to
respond as they normally do" Barksdale
says now. “If you come at them with a good
heart and the right amount of money, you
can get things done.” Barksdale, who current¬
ly runs his own venture capital fund from
his home in Aspen, Colorado, emphasizes
that he has enormous respect for Doerr and
considers him one of his closest friends.

Bug he says, “people who thought we would
reform the political process are naive.”

n "U f° r ^ose bygone days when Gore
U 2 i. | had Lhe power Lo charm his audi¬
ence. In January 1997, days before the Clin¬
ton administration's second inaugural, a
small hand of Internet entrepreneurs were
brought before the veep in the Old Execu¬
tive Office Building. Under the soaring,
ornate ceiling of Gore's ceremonial office,
Doerr, Kim Polese, Paul Lippe ofSynopsys,
Scott Cook of Intuit, and Adobe's Chuck
Geschke, among others, gathered around
a century-old mahogany desk once used by
Richard Nixon. Like eager pupils on a field
trip, they look turns sliding open the top
drawer lo see where every president since
Teddy Roosevelt had - in a moment of what
used to pass for presidential naughtiness -
carved his name in the wood.

Earlier that morning, they'd been ushered
past Secret Service agents and Marine guards
into the plush West Wing office of the WhiLe
House chief of staff, where, suddenly and
marvelously, Clinton had appeared as if by
chance. Randlett, who choreographed the
visit, watched with satisfaction as he breezed
through, shaking hands, squeezing elbows,
and patting shoulders. When it was over,
Randlett says, “People were feeling a little
distance between their butts and their chairs."

The old White House trick was played in
full that weekend, and the geeks fell hard.
There were confabs with senior White
House staffers, with Democratic National
Committee bigwigs and heavyweights on
Capitol Hill. There was special-access Lawn
seating a! the inauguration, a choice table
at a cozy DNC Victory Dinner, and entree to

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

010

IMAGES: DAVID BARR*

IMAGE: (TED GORILLA

cheapskates,

are, in mainstream political terms, _

with “deep pockets and short arms.

several inaugural balls.

Normally, of course, such blandishments
are reserved for people who have earned
them in a grueling campaign: load-bearing
Friends of the Administration. By those
standards, John Doerr’s delegation didn’t
qualify. Some had never even been to
Washington before. Some hadn’t always
bothered to vote. But A1 Gore, especially,
valued them as an investment. As Barbra
Streisand and Steven Spielberg were to
Bill, so, the inaugural welcome seemed to
suggest, the young Internet wizards would
be to the future Age of A1 Gore.

When F asked DoeiT to recall the exact
moment he fell for Gore, he pinpointed it
instantly: at that morning meeting, when
Gore turned to Kim Polesc and asked,
“How's Java?” Says Doerr: “That did it for
me. We all just geeked ouL.”

The lavish treatment his crew received
that weekend also proved the growth poten¬
tial of an idea that had taken root only a Few
months before, when Doerr set out to “put
the wiring into place’ 7 between the tech com¬
munity and Washington. He had been moti¬
vated by Proposition 211, a 1996 California
ballot initiative backed by San Diego trial
lawyer and longtime Valley nemesis Bill

Leracb. The measure would have made tech¬
nology startups and their directors vulnera¬
ble to class-action shareholder-fraud suits
when their volatile shares lost value. Doerr
considered Prop, 211 an act of “economic
terrorism’ 7 and vowed to tight back.

To hear the veterans of the battle tell it,
No on 211 was the Valley’s Boston Tea Party,
forging high tech tinkerers and merchants
into a revolutionary political class, Doerr
and two of his partners at Kleiner Perkins,
Brook Byers and Floyd Kvamme, trans¬
formed the firm's offices on Sand Hill Road
into Lhe industry’s war room, raising mil¬
lions for a TV ad campaign and gathering
major endorsements, including Clinton's,
to defeat lhe measure. The campaign forced
a showdown within the Democratic Party:
techies versus the notoriously powerful
trial lawyers. When it was over, lhe new¬
comers had kicked butt, convincing a spec¬
tacular 1 74 percent of California voters to
reject the measure. “No one thought we
could do that,” says Doerr, still savoring
the moment nearly three years later.

With characteristic let’s-make-this-tiling-
scale verve, the No on 2U brigade resolved
to take the Valley’s tort-reform crusade to
Washington. Reform legislation was pending

Opposite: Gore watches the Flying Other Brothers
at TechNet's Los Attos Hills fund-raiser; Wade
Randlett (at right), who left Tech Net this fait,
tackles the G2K problem from his new startup.

again before Congress, and Doerr fretted
that the Valley and the Beltway were danger¬
ously disconnected on an issue that could
choke the new economy. Despite Clinton’s
support in defeating 211, he had in 1995
vetoed a federal tort-reform bill (a favor to
the trial lawyers and one of only two vetoes
of his presidency to be overturned), and
Doerr didn’t want to see the industry blind¬
sided again.

“God, we had just spent $35 million to
keep a bad thing from happening,” he says,
“After that we said, 'Let’s get proactive. Let’s
build some bridges.’ ”

As general contractor, Doerr turned to
his No on 211 comrade-in-arms, Wade Rand¬
lett. Randlett helped Doerr and Byers with
a scheme to channel the leftover capital
and political energy from No on 211 into
a bipartisan coalition for civic activism -
and thus the Technology Network was born.
From its headquarters in Palo Alto, not
Washington, TechNet would educate people
inside the Bel tway on a range of issues:
litigation reform, establishing uniform
national standards for reading and mathe¬
matics, increasing H1B visa caps, making
the R&D tax credit permanent, and chal¬
lenging encryption-export restrictions.

The flyby approach of the ’80s - take
the Gulfstream to DC, tell Congress it was
brain-dead on, say, trade with Japan or
biotech regulation, head home - was dis¬
missed as crude and, worse, ineffective.
The commercialization of the Internet
changed everything. It broadened the Val¬
ley’s hardware- and software-manufactur¬
ing culture into a center of new media and
communications - an evolution that pul it
on a collision course with the regulatory'
apparatus of Washington. Gradually, a
whole new set of issues was taking shape:
telecom, interstate commerce, and First
Amendment concerns about privacy, libel,
and indecency on the Net. In short, it was

Oi □

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

time to replace disdain with diplomacy.

A1 Gore was ready and waiting. He had
been toiling on his exhaustive Reinventing
Government program; he had already started
promoting the notion of a paperless bureau¬
cracy, putting all taxpayer services on the
Internet and developing a “precisely tailored
set of empowerment tools” that would deter¬
mine the appropriate job-training, health
care, and education programs available to
needy families. Lately, he was talking about
harnessing the Net to reform public educa¬
tion. And, all the while, technology had
remained a backwater at the White House,

“Then, suddenly, it was at the forefront
of economic issues, national-security issues,
and, increasingly, political issues” says
Tim Newell, a former official in the White
House’s Office of Science and Technology,
who in 199b organized CEO endorsements
for Clinton and Gore. “It’s hard to over¬
estimate how much of a change that was.
Suddenly we realized, There’s this whole
generation that no one’s ever talked to? It
was unclaimed territory - political gold”

The White House made the standard
calculation that, if all went well, the con¬
nections with Doerr and the entrepreneurs
would translate to money and endorsements
down the road, in time for Gore 2000,

Moreover, the power of that first impres¬
sion had been mutual. “He immediately
struck me as a very likable guy with a keen
mind” the vice president says of Doerr,

“1 like to think about how new technologies
have an impact on the way we organize
our institutions and our society. He likes to
think about such things because he’s inter¬
ested in the commercial implications,”

By mid-1997, Doerr’s group was meeting
nearly once a month with Gore. Between
budget sessions and meetings with the Russ¬
ian prime minister, the names of Doerr,
Halsey Minor, Marc Andreessen, Jerry Yang,
and a rotating roster of other digerati started
to appear on Gore’s calendar. Doerr dubbed
his crew the Gore-Techs, and they promptly
become media darlings, a whole new cast of
technopolitical crossover artists. There were
emails and phone calls from Gore, imita¬
tions to conferences, speeches, photo ops,
and state dinners.

Gore was smitten. “These were the people
he had always hoped would be in the room
someday,” says Greg Simon, his former chief

domestic-policy adviser and now codirector
for the DC-based openNet coalition, “"fills
was a chance to talk to people who were
putting the Internet to use as he had always
envisioned it*

Gore is looking wary. He is sitting in
his private cabin aboard Air Force
Two, tanned and casual in a green corduroy
shirt and khakis as we fly to Washington
after a campaign swing to Southern Califor¬
nia. He is sipping coffee and leaning back
on a settee - signals that he’s in a metabolic
state of relaxation. But his chuckle feels
forced; his brow is furrowed. Sooner or
later, he must know, the conversation wiil
turn to T invented the Internet.”

That, of course, is not what Gore said to
Wolf Blitzer on CNN last March, What he
said - in explaining why he, and not Bill
Bradley, should be the Democratic nominee
- was litis: “When I was in Congress, I took
the lead in creating the Internet. I look the
initiative in moving forward a whole range
of initiatives that have proven to be impor¬
tant to our country’s economic growth, envi¬
ronmental protection, improvements in our
education system.”

In context, the assertion is not nearly as
ludicrous as Leno and Letterman would have
had us believe. As a member of the Senate
Subcommittee on Science and Technology,
Gore did spearhead funding of the 1991
High-Performance Computing and Commu¬
nications Act, which allowed scientists and
engineers to transform Arpanet from a closed
university and Defense Department system
into a commercially viable mass medium,
(See “The Gorecard”) “if you go back and
look at the hearings, nobody else was talking
about this,” Gore says, becoming animated
as he slowly realizes he’s not being sand¬
bagged. “It was only a rarified research net¬
work, and I believe that I was the only person
in public life who said publicly, over and over
again, Tiey, look, this has the potential to be
a national information superhighway,’ ”

Gore continues, putting down his coffee
and waving his arms for emphasis: “And I
leaped from that to the metaphor of an infor¬
mation superhighway and started trying to
proselytize about the benefit to our country
that would flow if we speeded up the emer¬
gence of that gestalt. And so, when I said,

T took the lead in Congress/ that point was

right And I should have said, ‘I took the lead
in Congress in helping to magnify the benefits
that flow from the creation of the Internet by
this small band of scientists and engineers.’”

Calf it Gore’s law: The more earnestly he
strives to convey the utility of his technolog¬
ical insight, the greater the rate at which it
recedes. Yon can see why the guy has image
problems. He doesn’t merely gather facts; he
marinates in great gobs of information, the
ultimate puipose of which baffles even his
closest aides, I had called a half-dozen of
Gore’s former and current senior advisers
to ask how he can generate political capital
from his digital prowess.

Only Simon had a quick answer: “This is a
man who imagines the future and then goes
out and builds it” The others got trapped by
Gore’s taw themselves, recounting wonder¬
fully involved anecdotes about the time he
invited a prominent Icelandic mathematician
to Lecture his top advisers on chaos theory, or
the hours he devoted as a junior senator to
organizing a colloquium oil coral bleaching,
or the time he Hew to the South Pole to leam
how scientists take core samples to measure
global wanning. (In this context, the Gore-
Techs were but the latest in a long line of
seminarians he has invited to tutor him.)

On a real roll now. Gore wants to know if
I’ve read Access Am erira, a report he directed
on putting government services on the Net,

I confess I haven’t, so he proceeds to sum¬
marize his vision of online government.
“Imagine? lie says with great emphasis al
Lhe start of each of several mini-lectures on
how information technology can be applied
to crime control, childhood immunization,
and classroom evaluations. He wants to put
more government programs on the Internet
so a “community-based facilitator” can “coor¬
dinate a very precise set of empowering
tools” to help the needy. “That sounds like
an unrealistic goal right now, but it’s really
not” he concludes. TPs an achievable goal.”

As Fm about to leave his cabin, duly
impressed if slightly numbed by the deluge
of data, Gore asks brightly if Fve read the
transcripts of his 1981 House hearings on
sheep cloning. Briefly, I consider lying, but
ray blank look gives me away. It’s patently
obvious that T have disappointed the vice
president of the United States.

“Ah, never mind,” he says, waving me off
gently.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

0zm

THE

GORECARD

No question, Ai Gore has been a prominent voice in technology debates, but what's
he saying? Examine his record as a senator and as vice president, and you find a mix
of geek, ecommerce booster, and big-government nanny. This year Gore helped
deliver $700 million to wire public schools and rallied against slapping a federal tax
on your monthly Internet dialup bill. But he also rode shotgun for an adminstration
that long resisted loosening the reins on cryptography exportation and instituted
sweeping legislation controlling what can and cannot be said online. - Kristin Demos

High-Performance Computing and
Communications Act (1991)

Before major political figures, or even
most everyday people, cared about the Net,
then-Senator Gore pushed the develop¬
ment of a first-of-its-kind high-bandwidth
network intended to carry 3-D graphic
images and large data files generated
by supercomputers.Three billion dollars
flooded the program, and by 1996 the
National Research and Education Network
was able to transfer 1 gigabyte of data.
NREN is a web of federal networks that
exists as part of what is now known as the
Internet. After appropriations ran out in
1996, the 1998 Next-Generation Internet
Research Act was signed into law to
update HPCC and authorize additional
funds to build a terabyte-capable network
for governmental and academic research
and technology development.

Clipper Chip (1993)

As vice president, Gore was originally for
the Clipper Chip - a device installed in
phones, faxes, and modems to encrypt
voice and data. Billed as a way for busi¬
nesses to protect proprietary information
and safeguard personal conversations, the
proposal also put the decryption keys in
the hands of the government. It was
stymied by opposition from civil-liberties
groups like the Center for Democracy and
Technology, which balked at the institu¬
tionalization of governmental access to
encrypted communications without the
consent or knowledge of the sender. Gore
retreated from his stance and supported
reworking the legislation (Clipper N, Clip¬
per III), but ultimately no chip has ever
been enforced.

Telecommunications Act (1996)

The many faces of AI were evidenced in three
controversial pieces of legislation embedded
in the Telecom Act. First, the civil libertarian:
He opposed the Communications Decency
Act and its criminalization of posting material
deemed "patently offensive" or "indecent"
for minors online. The CDA was later struck
down by the US Supreme Court as unconsti¬
tutional and a threat to free speech. Next,
the nanny: He supported the mandatory
installation of a chip in TVs so parents can
block programs deemed inappropriate
because of excessive violence. Effective
January 1,2000, all newly manufactured TV
sets 13 inches or larger wilt have an embed¬
ded V-chip. Finally, he supported the E-rate
(dubbed the "Goretax"), which collects up to
$2.5 billion annually from the telcos to pay
to wire schools and libraries to the Internet

The Digital Millennium
Copyright Act (1998)

As murmurs from the Recording Industry
Association of America and others rose
regarding renegade downloading of copy¬
righted material and global theft of intel¬
lectual property Gore rallied behind a
radical upgrade of copyright laws for the
digital era. The law increased the length
of copyright protection for the copyright
holder another 20 years, made it a crime
to create or sell technology that could
be used to break copyright-protection
devices, and implemented international
treaties signed at the World Intellectual
Property Organization. Critics attacked
the law because it made online service
providers liable when users infringe on
a copyright - rather than the users them¬
selves, who can be difficult to trace.

Child Online Protection Act (1998)

Gore watched in silence as the president
signed COPA, which made it a federal
crime for commercial Web sites to post
material deemed "harmful to minors,"
including distributing any picture, writ¬
ing, or recording that "lacks serious liter¬
ary, artistic, political, or scientific value for
minors." Gore also personally backed the
launch of GetNetWise, a resource site for
parents offering downloadable filtering
and blocking software. A case against
COPA - brought by the Electronic Privacy
Information Center, the ACLU, and other
organizations - is now pending before the
US Court of Appeals, and enforcement of
COPA has been enjoined. Critics argue that
COPA compromises free speech just as the
CDA did and will suffer the same fate.

internet Tax Freedom Act (1998)

To spur further commercial development
of the Internet, the law placed a three-year
moratorium on levying any federal, state,
or local taxes on Internet-access fees or
ecommerce transactions, both domestic
and international. Despite backing govern¬
ment regulation of online content. Gore
convinced Clinton to oppose the National
Governors Association and support a hands-
off approach regarding Internet taxation.

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

t Doerr would have you think

J U A11JL he is the Forrest Gump of
politics - pure of heart, just darned lucky,
and slightly perplexed about tile adventures
that have come his way. It's not totally an
act - Doerris commitment to improving
public schools has a genuine, unadulterated
fervor - but there clearly arc more complex
motives at work as well.

Doerr learned how to work the levers in
Washington during the summer of 1986,
when, on sabbatical from Kleiner Perkins,
he served as a fellow on the Senate Armed
Services Committee. Working for Colorado
Democrat Tim Wirth, Doerr made a routine
of dining with one resident Washington
player each evening and spent his days
researching the Pentagon to learn every¬
thing he could about the Arpanet. He
studied M cooF technologies like Sun and
Ethernet, which he would later build into
companies. Making connections was easy:
“if you were a staffer on the Armed Services
Committee,” Doerr discovered, “you could
call up anybody, anyplace in the military,

panics trying to limit ISP access to their
existing networks, while Andreessen is in
AOUs camp, demanding more.)

In some ways, Doerrs unifying vision, as
expressed in the early life of TechNet, is
more critical now than ever before. But the
young machers have companies to run, for¬
tunes to manage, new markets to conquer.
Who’s got time to talk education reform
with AJ Gore?

Andreessen embodies the agnosticism of
ihe Valley’s younger elite. He likes Gore.

He’s given money to him and hosted fund¬
raisers for him, and he’ll probably do so
again. He was a sophomore in college when
Gore voted for the High-Performance Com-
puting Aci, Imi he knows his history. After
Gore’s Internet gaffe, Andreessen pitched in
to help the veep’s damage-control operation,
telling reporters Gore deserved much of the
credit for funding the National Computa¬
tional Science Alliance at the University
of Illinois, where Andreessen’s spectacular
career was launched. He tells his friends
the guy is worth voting for because “he

understand what’s going on and in general
have pretty good policies.

“I think that Bush would be hue, 1 think
that Gore would be good ” Andreessen says.
“E think Bradley would probably do a good
job, McCain would do a good job ” Only a
sudden surge by Pat Buchanan would cause
panic among the digerati, Andreessen adds,
because of his anti-immigration and protec¬
tionist beliefs.

So there’s nothing special about A1 Gore?
Despite all his expertise, and all those meet¬
ings in Washington and in the Valley, noth¬
ing that sets him apart? And, uh, isn’t
Andreessen supposedly endorsing Gore?

“The nice thing about this is, it’s not like
it has to be Gore or ibis industry Is just
hosed” be responds. “Or that Gore is the
only one who understands any of this or is
going to do an effective job. He’s just into
it more than the rest of them are - he’s into
it more than anyone else has ever been at
that level ”

Doerr’s once-eager band of Gore loyalists
is dwindling. An unscientific survey reveals

Kleiner Perkins’

fourth law: “There is a time when panic
is the appropriate response." But this, says Doerr, is not the time.

and they’d return your call *

That same calculation figures into his
relationship with Gore. Though Doerr is at
pains to present his political goals as strictly
idealistic, it would he impossible to overlook
the commercial and personal interests also
at stake. Considering his perch as Valley
kingmaker, you almost - but not quite -
believe him when he downplays the allure
of an appointment in a Gore administration.
(His takeaway from the Senate fellowship
was that “politics is a terrible job - you are
always reactive”) And how could there not
be an obvious enticement in the prospect
of having a friend - and a technologically
savvy one at that - in the White House?

A lot has changed, too, since early 1997.
Now Doerr’s young charges have become
celebrity CEOs, and the allure of wiring the
government has been superseded by major,
acrimonious policy differences within the
industry. Doerr and Marc Andreessen, for
example, staked out conflicting positions
over broadband access. (Doerr is philosoph¬
ically aligned with AT&T and the cable com-

really understands what we do out here,
and what this stuff means, better than any¬
one out there *

But Andreessen is not putting anything
on the line for Gore. There is nothing in his
congenial tone that remotely approximates
the stand-on-the-tracks-and-stop-the-train
Washington way of pledging oneself to a
candidate - whether out of belief, obligation,
or the chance for personal advancement.

Andreessen, courteous and articulate,
at the age of 28 has the potential to be a
kingmaker himself, and he knows it. The
candidates will parade before him and his
brethren, hoping to be chosen. They’ve
all been educated about the power of the
Net. They all say the right things. There
may be differences on social issues like
abortion, gun control, and school vouchers,
but when it comes to issues that matter to
the industry, it seems, almost any candidate
will do.

And that’s precisely the point. Andreessen
tells me the current crop all seem to be
“pretty reasonable people who generally

that all those hours of face time have not
worked political magic with some Gore-
Tech alumni, either. At Yahoo!, Jerry Yang’s
assistant fires off an email: “It has NEVER
been correct to describe Jerry as a 'Gore
supporter.’” A company spokesperson notes
with obvious displeasure that the White
House keeps giving oul Yang*s name to
reporters. For the record, Yang does not
intend to publicly pledge himself to any
candidate, though he did give $20,000 to
the DNC in 1998.

Bill Hambrecht, cofounder of Hambrecht
& Quist who left to start the investment-
banking firm W, R. Hambrecht & Co., has
been considered a Gore backer, but he has
contributed to Bradley (“a longtime Prince¬
ton connection ” observes Doerr). A secre¬
tary curtly announces that Hambrecht will
support “whoever the Democratic nominee
happens to be.” CNF.T’s Halsey Minor, after
an intense courtship, is now r in George W.’s
camp. Other Valley leaders respond that
they have no time to get involved in any
campaign.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

IMAGE: (PHOTO] AP/WI0E WORLD PHOTOS

Gore claims he welcomes the free-for-all
in whal was once an easy market But the
techies' diffidence angers Greg Simon. “1
can't tel] you how many people 1 meet at
these conferences who tell me, 'Gore just
doesn't excite me. He just doesn't make my
heart go pitter-patter the way Clinton did,'”
he says. “The thing they love about Clinton
is the seduction. Well, Clinton is a seducer,
both in the good sense and the not-so-good
sense. Gore is a persuader Clinton goes for
the heart. Gore goes for the mind.

“Gore was their champion * says Simon,
“And now it's, 4 How far can I stray?' ”

Risk management being a time-honored
principle in the markets, can Simon blame
dynamos for hedging their bets? “Daytrader
mentality” is closer to the truth, he says,
“Sell on news. Buy on rumor. Gore delivered
on the expectations, so now the chat room
says it’s time to dump him and buy Bradley.”

The mood is also fractious at TeehNet
headquarters these days. The group is still
ensconced in the pleasant Mediterranean-
style office in downtown Palo Alto it leases
from Kleiner Perkins. But the startup days
are over. There are plans to expand to
accommodate its growing employee ros-
ter and the stampede of politicians who
want to come and touch the future before
election day.

Tech Net's new CEO is Roberta Katz, a
protege of Barksdale's at Netscape, where
she served as general counsel. Katz also
holds a PhD in cultural anthropology from
Columbia, where she wrote her dissertation
on “what happens to human values in times
of change.” She views her work at TeehNet
as “applied anthropology” trying to help
Washington and Silicon Valley understand
each other’s strange ways.

Kata is fond of metaphors. She views her¬
self as a “cultural ambassador” and Tech-
Net as Washington's “portal to the high tech
community.” She winces as she acknowl¬
edges that politicians increasingly view
TeehNet as a cash register. Her staff mem¬
bers spend a good part of their days fending
off calls from obscure members of Congress
who want the group to organize a fund¬
raiser for them with All the Right People.

Fund-raising, Katz insists, is not TechNet’s
primary purpose. “This is about education "
she stresses; Tech Net's primary role is to
teach lawmakers about the new technologies

they must legislate. So far, the group has
hosted more than 200 lawmakers who want
to visit the Valley, organizing tours of com¬
panies, technology demonstrations, and
opportunities to meet the digerati, who may
or may not be moved to write a check when
the politician calls.

Katz has upheld what she calls TechNet's
“ecumenical approach ” serving all presi¬
dential hopefuls equally, though it would
be absurd to ignore the high profile Doerr
has taken in supporting Gore and that Cisco
CEO John Chambers has assumed in touting
Bush, Katz recently tapped one staffer to make
sure Bradley’s interests were represented.

In September, after clashing with Katz over
his efforts to organize TechNet's Democratic
membership into a Gore base, Wade Randlett

Bradley and McCain, even Warren Beatty and
Donald Trump, and who knows who else, but
in the end A1 Gore will stand alone on the
pedestal - because America, though it may
not know it yet, is out to hire a new CEO.

“Maybe,” Doerr avers, “I identify too
much with the role of a board of directors
when it chooses a Scott McNealy to run Sun
Microsystems or a Steve Jobs to turn Apple
around - or the disastrous results when the
wrong choice is made. When I look at Ai
Gore through that prism, 1 see wisdom, I
see experience. Sign me up for the smarter,
more experienced candidate, as opposed to
the more charismatic one ”

Though Doerr is frenetic where Gore is
almost pathologically measured, it goes
without saying that the VC and the VP are

quit TeehNet. He joined a San Francisco Net
startup, Red Gorilla, and the move was spun
as a routine leap into private-sector lucre.
But murmurs were heard among the Gore
hardcore that Katz was trying to turn Tech-
Net and its now-considerable financial and
political clout away from the vice president.
The Busbies - so rumors had it - were,
with Katz's help, trying to reclaim the Valley
for the Republicans after the Clinton-Gore
hijacking. Katz scoffs at the notion of parti¬
san intrigue, but seems relieved to be rid of
Randlett and his founder's zeal.

Kleiner!

Perkins’ fourth law
states: “There is a
time when panic is the appropriate response ”
Rut this, says John Doerr, is not the time.
“There will be buzz and hype” about Bush and

alike in many ways - each quirky, earnest,
and wondrously smart, each fiercely ambi¬
tious, disciplined, and driven by a bound¬
less faith in the power of technology to
improve the human condition.

Both men travel the prophetic edge of
their respective worlds - Doerr in anticipat¬
ing market trends, Gore in presaging the
intersections of technology and public policy.
And both seem oddly oblivious to a lesson
the Valley has proven a thousand times over:
It can be dangerous to get too far ahead
of the pack Innovators are notoriously vul¬
nerable to the next in line, who capitalize
strategically on the lag and then seize the
final advantage.

And of failing to see the future, no one
could accuse John Doerr or Al Gore, At
least, not yet, • ■ ■

WIRED DECEMBER ) 999

EARTH ORBIT

ASA’S NEAR EARTH ASTEROID RENDEZVOUS
HEAR) SPACECRAFT HEADS INTO SPACE.

• 3. 1/23/98 !

r ----~--

: NEAR SWINGS WITHIN 33S MILES OF EARTH, >
; THEN 800MERANGS BACK INTO SPACE.

. LAUNCH 2/17/96

| 5. 2/14/00

! FOUR VEARS AFTER LAUNCH,

| NEAR ARRIVES TO ORBIT EROS.

2* 6/27/97

NEAR FUES WITHIN 753 MILES
OF THE ASTEROID MATHILDE,

WITH GRAVITY IN YOUR GAS TANK,

THE SHORTEST LINE BETWEEN TWO CELESTIAL POINTS
BECOMES A COSMIC LOOP-OE-LQOP.

4. 12/23/96

FROM 2,318 MILES AWAY, NEAR GETS
ITS FIRST LOOK AT ASTEROID EROS,

ON EARTH, FALLING IS A STRAIGHTFORWARD BUSINESS, AND GRAVITY

rather dull: You're up, then you're down,That's it
In space, though, things are different Jn space there is no rest everything
is falling. But it falls around, not down. Planets fall around stars, moons fall
around planets.They keep going forever, yet they do not repeat themselves.
As soon as there are more than two things falling around each other, gravity
becomes complicated, new paths endlessly become available. Johannes
Kepler, who put rules to the planets'movements in the 17th century, imag¬
ined them humming a ceaselessly shifting melody, the music of the spheres.

So in space, falling is a science, inscribed in Kepler's laws and Isaac New¬
ton's equations.It's also a practical skill. A cleverly designed trajectory means
that a spacecraft uses less fuel - always at a premium - and thus gets to
places it otherwise could not afford to go. And in some hands, it's an art
Take NASA's Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous spacecraft. Having been
thrown off Earth by a Delta-2 rocket on February 17, 1996, NEAR has been
falling around the sun ever since. For its first year in space, NEAR fell away
from Sol, and past the orbit of Mars, farther than any spacecraft reliant on
solar power had ever gone before,Then, slowly at first, NEAR began to drop
back in. On June 27,1997, it flew past an asteroid called Mathilde, only the
second spacecraft to visit one of these flying mountains, sending back pic¬
tures of a lump of coal the size of Hawaii's Big Island. On January 23,1998,
NEAR was back at its home planet, passing so dose that Earth's gravity was
able to reshape its path.The spacecraft whipped over the southern oceans
and flew off in a new direction, finally ready for its rendezvous with the
near-Earth asteroid Eros,

Eros is not to be a one-night stand like Mathilde; it is NEAR 1 s final des¬
tination. If all goes as planned, the little spacecraft will swing into orbit
around Eros In February and start mapping the tiny world in exquisite
detail. From then on, the asteroid and the spacecraft will be inseparable,
NEAR falling around Eros while Eros fails around the sun.

Why take such a long way around? Largely to save fuel and thus money.
The Delta-2 rocket that lobbed NEAR up into the sky did not have enough
energy to throw it straight to Eros, Although Eros comes pretty close to
Earth at times, the plane in which it falls around the sun is at an angle to
the plane Earth orbits in, which means it takes more oomph than you
might expect to get there. Only by heading off in a completely different
direction for a year and then coming back, on a course perfectly chosen to
make the best use of Earth's gravity, could NEAR ever make it out to Eros,

It takes an odd scientific subtlety to see that sort of possibility.That

subtlety is part of what has made NEAR’ s mission director - a short, dapper
engineer named Bob Farquhar - one of the space program's unlikely stars.
It may be the only subtle thing about him. Farquhar can be so full of himself
he overflows. But he's also a master of the art of the fall in all its unearthly
exuberance. Asteroids, comets, even plain old planets - he can find you an
unusually cost-effective way to any of them. And recently that's been a skill
much in demand.

For a long time, the overall trajectory of NASA's planetary-exploration
program seemed to echo the way things fell on Earth: It went downhill,
slowly but surely. Missions beyond Earth's orbit became rarer and rarer -
a couple each decade or so. In the early 1990s, though, the trajectory turned,
when NASA set up a new planetary-science program: the Discovery missions,
designed to be scientifically impressive but cheap and small-scale, run by
freestanding teams of scientists, laboratories, and companies rather than
the space agency's in-house bureaucracy. NEAR was the first of these mis¬
sions to be launched. Mars Pathfinder the second. Lunar Prospector the
third.The fourth, Stardust, a spacecraft that will bring samples of a comet's
dust plume back to Earth, set off in February '99.

By summer 1999, NASA had chosen four more missions from the dozens
of applications made for funds. And on two of them, scheduled for liftoff
in 2002 and 2004, Farquhar is mission director: Messenger is to voyage to
Mercury, finishing off the mapping of that planet begun in 1973 and left
in limbo during planetary exploration's lean years. Contour is to send a
simple little spacecraft falling past a series of comets in an orbit that
looks like a party streamer caught in a tornado.The latter project is Far¬
quhar J s pride and joy."Asteroids are OK, but I like comets," says the naviga¬
tional artist."They have unique characters"- and that's an attribute he
appreciates. Contour's mission to three comets, using Earth flybys to change
its trajectory six times, is a minimum-fuel, maximum-panache mission no
one else would have thought of.

Despite a dose encounter with congressional budget cutters in October
that threatened to wreck all Farquhar's plans, Messenger and Contour are
still on track for their launch. And though he's at work helping them along
and planning follow-ups, Farquhar's never too busy to brag a bit, to bitch
("When 1 get a little successful I become a prima donna"), or to critique
other people's plans, crowing over how they could have done things better
with a phasing orbit or an extra flyby. It's a rare discussion with Farquhar
that doesn't include the phrase "Well, if they'd listened to me .,.

"The man is a genius with celestial pinball," says Don Yeomans, a comet
and asteroid specialist who's known Farquhar for 30 years,"and he'd be the
first to admit it."

A product of NASA's "faster,
cheaper, better" initiative, the
Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous
space probe k on a brllton-plus-
mile journey from Earth to Eros.

WHEN HE FINISHED HIGH SCHOOL LN CHICAGO IN THE EARLY >50$, BOB

Farquhar could see nothing better to do with his time than hang around
basketball courts, play the odd game of pool, and chase nurses at the hospi¬
tal where his mother worked. He drifted In and out of jobs and colleges, then
spent a few years as a paratrooper. Although it would be fitting if his choice
of jobs in the military had resulted from a love of free-fall trajectories, the
truth is, he simply wanted to show that a tittle guy could still be a tough guy.

After a stint in Korea, he started thinking about aerospace engineering,
having always liked designing and building model airplanes.Then, in 1957,

Oliver Morton (oliver@dial.pipex.com) writes about science and technology
from the shadow of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich , England; he is work¬
ing on a book about maps and Mars .

IMAGE.: PAT RAWUNGS/COURTESY JOHNS HOPKIKS UNIVERSITY APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY

;.v$m fSi -s*’ >«.. p-Ji£>4PH L/<. £■

WAK mission director Bob Farquhar (right) and design
team leader David Dunham fire a model rocket on the
grounds of Johns Hopkins'Applied Physics Laboratory,
outside Baltimore. Their next missions for NASA are
slated to launch in 2002 and 2004,

while he was taking his first celestial-mechanics course at the University
of Illinois, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik. Farquhar r s professor had his
students calculate the orbit, and Farquhar realized he'd stumbled onto
something pretty neat It wasn't much later that he realized he was good
at it. In his PhD thesis, Farquhar described how you could put a space
probe into an orbit with nothing at its center* When something smaller
orbits something bigger (Earth around the sun, the moon around Earth)
there is a point between them where the two gravitational fields effectively
cancel each other out These points are at the center of what Farquhar calls
"halo orbits," in which a spacecraft loops around and around nothing, like
a knot on a jump rope swung by two kids*Thirty years after Farquhar
described how to get to such orbits, they have become popular destina¬
tions for all sorts of space missions.

In the early 70s, Farquhar was a key member of the first team to make use
of a halo orbit, putting a spacecraft called International Sun-Earth Explorer 5
into a closed loop nearly 1 million miles sunward of Earth to study the solar
wind. When it became clear NASA was not going to send a mission to Halley's
comet, Farquhar found a way to flip ISEE-3 out of its original orbit and use
some of the fuel left in its tanks to send it careering around the Earth-moon
systemjhe fifth time it passed Earth's natural satellite, the probe was head¬
ing in just the right direction for the moon's gravity to fling it through the
tail of a comet called Giacobini-Zinner - about six months before space¬
craft from Japan, the Soviet Union, and Europe made it to Halley, thus
making the US the first country to reach a comet."Getting there," Farquhar

5 it final checkup at the
Space Flight Center in

being sent to

iveral for launch in 1 996.

later remarked about this piece of one-upmanship,"is half the fun."

Meanwhile, the scientists who'd been using ISEE-3 to study solar wind
watched in a huff as the craft was swiped from their project.

In the process of getting to Giacobini-Zinner, Farquhar invented one of
his finest orbital tricks, the double lunar swtngby.Chauncey Uphoff, one of
Farquhar's few peers in the trajectory business and a man who's also been
known to wield a fair pool cue, calls it "not just a useful exploration tool
but a discovery of great beauty." Its utility comes from the fact that it
allows you to change the angle between a satellite's trajectory around
Earth and the line between Earth and the sun. If you're going from Earth's
orbit to another planet, that's a trick you need to master. Farquhar found a
way to do it cheaply with a set of trajectories symmetrical with respect to
the moon that can be used to shift the orbit around with respect to the
sun. If you believed, like Kepler, in the music of the spheres, thinking up the
double lunar swingby was like writing a repeatable riff that can serve as a
segue between different tunes in different time signatures.

As a writer of new orbital tunes, Farquhar was a natural. But he wanted
to play them, too. And unfortunately, in the decades he was at NASA's
Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, there was a distinct lack of
space-going instruments on which to perform.The few planetary mis¬
sions NASA was launching were all under the control of the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, the large facility dedicated mostly to planetary science that
Caltech runs for NASA. ISEE-3 - renamed International Cometary Explorer,
a ka ICE f when it set out for Giacobini-Zinner - was the only mission

Farquhar was able to run in all his time at Goddard.

Then, after his retirement from NASA in 1990, Farquhar, like the planetary
program in general, got a new lease on life.

THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY KEEPS

a low profile, which is entirely to the satisfaction of its clients in the Penta¬
gon. It has designed a lot of spacecraft, but many of them have been mili¬
tary satellites. However, as defense spending fell after the Cold War, it made
sense to look elsewhere for business, and the head of APL's space division,
Stamatios'Tom" Krimigis, set his sights on the solar system.

It was partly thanks to some remarks by Krimigis that, in 1990, NASA
first started thinking about the possibility of a bargain-basement asteroid
mission in the $150 million rangeJPL said that such economy was simply
impossible. APL came in with an estimate of about $110 million. After a
little politics, APL's NEAR became the first Discovery mission; the Mars
Pathfinder, run out of JPL, became the second. By that time, Krimigis had
gone out and hired Bob Farquhar.

Small space missions depend crucially on the small teams that run
them. While aiming to be "faster, cheaper, better" (per NASA administrator
Daniel Goldin's exhortation), they also tend to be more human, taking
place on the scale of a neighborhood gang and rife with idiosyncrasies -
of people, of programming, of personality, Tom Krimigis saw a place for
bright, brash Farquhar on hisstaff:"He was the right man; this was the
right place."

Farquhar describes his mission-manager role at APL as being
like an architect's. Given an objective, such as getting to an
asteroid, he takes account of the requirements, the technical
possibilities, the politics, and the opportunities for chutzpah,
and comes up with a plan that balances all the forces - bud¬
getary, scientific, and gravitational. His plans have the elegance
of form following function, and they also have decorative
detailing - quirky, clever, sometimes self-indulgent. There are
various flourishes on the NEAR flight path, for instance, that
are pure showmanship, and one - getting the mission's first
data from the Math Side flyby just before JPL's Pathfinder landed
on the face of Mars - that looks nicely political.

Like many architects, Farquhar is a mathematicians politi¬
cian, a show-off - and a romantic. He's the man with the ideas,
and the Discovery program has an eager appetite for them.

SOMETIMES, THOUGH, SPACECRAFT HAVE IDEAS OF THEIR

own.Take the afternoon of Sunday, December 20,1998. Far¬
quhar was watching the 49ers on a little portable in his office,
killing time before overseeing a critical fine-tuning of NEAR‘s
fall towa rd Eros. When his boys finally lost he headed off down
APL's seemingly endless corridors to the mission operations
room, where the NEAR team was getting ready for a crucial
shove from the spacecraft's main engine that would slow the
craft down just enough for it to go into orbit around the
asteroid 21 days later.

In the mission operations center Farquhar's place was at
the head of a largish table around which the project's other
top brass were gathered. Next door, the operations crew hud¬
dled around computer workstations. Various people shuttled
between the rooms, notably Mark Hold ridge. Farquhar is the
overall mission manager, but he isn't one for the details of
actually running a spacecraft.That's Holdridge's job; you could
tell he was the point man from the fact that it was his name
on all the empty pizza boxes neatly stacked in the comer.

There were only about 15 people in each room, but even so
there was not, in truth, much for most of the managers to do.
The instructions telling the spacecraft how and when to start
its engine had been sent up long before.The people around
the table were for the most part spectators, not players - but
spectators with a deep investment and immense expertise.
Everyone there knew that Mars Observer, a near-billion-dollar
JPL project, was lost in 1993 while the lab attempted a maneu¬
ver much like the one NEAR was about to undertake. But unlike
/Wars Observer, NEAR had already used its main engines, and
they had given it no trouble at all The biggest practical con¬
cern anyone had was the weather in California.There were
strong winds at the site of the antenna listening to NEAR's
faint, reassuring signals, and if there were any more gusts
over 50 mph,the antenna would be shut down.

At the appointed time, the spacecraft announced that it
had started the course correction by firing its hydrazine
thrusters - miniature engines turned on to settle the fuel
in the tanks before the main rocket switched on. Then, at the
point when the main engine was meant to ignite that fuel,

contact with NEAR was lost. The group reassured itself that
this was not inauspicious. While the spacecraft was maneuver¬
ing, the antenna may well have lost track of its signal, the
frequency of which shifts as the probe's velocity changes.
Besides, to relieve tension, you could always tease Farquhar.

"If you didn't have any friends or relations, we could have been
there two years ago," someone quipped.

To get the joke you have to know that the entire mission
was carefully timed: It was no coincidence Farquhar had
visited his first wife's grave that morning; December 20 was
Bonnie Farquhar's birthday. January 10,1999, the day the
spacecraft was due at Eros, was the fifth anniversary of his
civil marriage to his second wife, Irina. The mission's nominal
completion date, February 6,2000, was the anniversary of his
church weddings to both Irina and Bonnie.

Farquhar fine-tuned the mission's design to get NEAR to Eros
a little earlier than it would otherwise have done, in order to
commemorate the loves of his life.

The fart that he was able to do this gives him great sentimen¬
tal pleasure; letting it be known that he's done it gives him a
stunt to brag about. Some people say such self-indulgence costs
Farquhar credibility. Others find it almost as amusing as he does.

Amusing, but never without risk. Perhaps because falling -
even when done in the highest-tech way possible - is always
nerve-racking, ex-paratrooper Farquhar is a great believer in
contingency plans. One navigational error - in the case of JPL's
ill-fated Mars Climate Orbiter, mistaking English measurements
for metric ones - can result in the loss of an entire mission. So
while Isaac Newton's doing the driving, as Apotfo 8 astronaut
Bill Anders once put it, Farquhar's in the backseat keeping a very
careful eye on what's coming up.Throughout the NEAR mission
he'd had his colleague David Dunham calculating all sorts of
trajectories that could be put to use if things went wrong.

Ten minutes Into NEAR's December 20 silence, Dunham
walked into the managers' part of the operations center, his
document case of contingency calculations held to his chest
in both hands tike a little shield.

Dunham is Farquhar's closest partner and his almost per¬
fect complement. Where Farquhar is short and expansive,
Dunham is tall and shy. Farquhar chatters, Dunham mumbles.
Farquhar starts with sharp insights and follows through with
broad brush strokes, Dunham works out details with deliber¬
ate, exacting precision. Farquhar cheerfully collects the acco¬
lades for the both of them; Dunham doesn't seem to mind.

"The architects are the dreamers, and the engineers are the
doers," says Holdridge, remembering a summer spent working
as an inspector on the Baltimore subway."And that's very much
the way I look at the relationship that Bob has with Dave and
me. Bob puts the splash and one-upmanship into the equation,
and we figure out how to get it done. Then he takes the credit"
Indeed, Farquhar will tell you exactly the same thing; he takes
pride in it "And that almost makes it bearable," says Holdridge,
with a grin."At least he's honest."

Dunham's arrival at mission operations was an opportunity
for more banter. After all, no one really thought the spacecraft

WIRED DECEMBER 1993

030

FARQUHAR IS A GENIUS WITH CELESTIAL PINBALL,”
SAYS A COLLEAGUE WHO’S KNOWN HIM FOR 30 YEARS
AND HE’D BE THE FIRST TO ADMIT IT.”

IMAGE: MARK HElTHOFF

was bst.lt was just the course correction interfering with communications.
Wasn't it? Sure it was, they reassured each other.

But the spacecraft was still silent. And, increasingly, so were the man¬
agers.The operations team next door, though, was making itself busy.
Various ideas were being floated, the most popular of which seemed to be
that the people in charge of the antenna were looking in the wrong place
or at the wrong frequency.Then there was the possibility that the space¬
craft had already started looking at Eros, which it had to do to check its
navigation, and thus wasn't pointing its antenna at Earth.

After a couple of hours, the innocent explanations were all used up.
Something was wrong. Analysis of the spacecraft's last radio transmissions
showed that the rocket burn dearly hadn't happened and that something
bad most likely had. Crisis meetings were called. Still the silence went on.
Farquhar was convinced NEAR was gone for good. When he called Irina late
on Sunday night, he asked her what it was like being married to a failure.

Tom Krimigis, though, never lost faith."We will get it back if we just keep
trying," he told everyone, apparently unflappable.

Sure enough, after 27 hours of silence, NEAR'S radio was heard again.
Holdridge's team eventually worked out that when the main engine had
started up on the 20th, it had done so a bit roughly, and the spacecraft had
immediately shut the rocket down in self-defense.This left NEAR tumbling,
and for reasons that are still not entirely clear, it found getting out of the
tumble difficult. In its flapping about, it went "antisun" - its solar arrays
found themselves in shadow - and lost power.Worried, as its programmers
had taught it to be, It shut down various systems (including the radio) and
concentrated on getting power back.

After spending the day basking in the sun recharging its batteries, NEAR
started scanning the sky with its radio beams again, calling for Earth. Earth
heard it, and a couple of dozen earthlings let out sighs of relief.

By the early morning of December 22, Mark Holdridge's operations team
had put the little ship back on an even keel. But the relative motions of
spacecraft and asteroid meant that any possibility of slowing its fall in such
a way as to get to Eros on the appointed date was long gone. New instruc¬
tions were rushed up to the spacecraft so that the asteroid - three or four
Everests jammed together into an elongated kidney shape - could be
caught on camera as it tumbled past at about 2,000 mph later that day.
Most spacecraft encounters are planned over the course of months; this
one was hacked together in a matter of hours.

And so 15 years to the day after they skimmed ISEE-3/ICE over the dark
side of the moon and outward to a comet, Bob Farquhar and David Dunham
were feverishly busy again. Farquhar was not going to be satisfied with just
a flyby of Eros, a mission that would go down as at best a partial success.
"I'm a poor loser," he told me once, before checking himself with a grin and
adding,"but I'm a poor winner, too - I rub the other guy's face in it."

Farquhar and Dunham combed the contingency plans for the best
possibilities. One involved a maneuver on December 28 that would have
gotten the probe into orbit around Eros on July 20,1999. Farquhar quite
liked that - it would be the 30th anniversary of the first Apollo moon
landing. It would also be the 23rd anniversary of the first American robot
landing on Mars - an event originally intended for July 4,1976. (Farquhar
is not the only person in the space program who has a weakness for
anniversaries.)

Some of the people at NASA headquarters and APL thought a rocket
burn so soon after getting the spacecraft back would be a bit too risky,
however. Another orbit was produced, and on January 3,1999, having

been told not to be quite so sensitive to a bit of rocket-induced roughness,
NEAR fired its main engine perfectly for what was probably the last time.

On February 2,2000, NEAR's little maneuvering engines will apply the final
touches to its new trajectory. With well over a billion miles on the odometer,
the tiny spacecraft will rendezvous with Eros on February 14 - Valentine's
Day. Even in extremis, Farquhar has had time to indulge himself.

In a way, that time may be running out. Next-generation planetary mis¬
sions will make ever more use of ion engines, devices capable of delivering
low thrust for very long periods of time. That will allow them to do things
that falling alone would never permit.There will still be a place for craft
and guile - fuel will always matter. But the skills involved In finding odd
little pathways around the solar system will be less vital when fully motor¬
ized vehicles go where they will,

Farquhar, though, has got more than enough up in the air to satisfy him
for the rest of his career.There's Messenger, there's Contour - and there's
always /Cf.The tiny spacecraft he threw to a comet in 1983 is slowly wend¬
ing its way back to Earth. it will arrive in August 2014, and Farquhar has
every intention of being around to greet the prodigal, kill a fatted calf or
two - and send it straight off somewhere else.

ICE doesn't have much by way of fuel or state-of-the-art instrumenta¬
tion, but it's falling toward a flyby with Earth, and that's enough for Far-
quhar. Maybe he'll put it back into the halo orbit from which he took it as
a way of placating the solar physicists who still think he basically stole the
spacecraft from them. Maybe there will be another comet worth visiting.
And maybe he'll find a way to throw it off somewhere completely new,
letting it fall down a path no one else ever Imagined.

□ 3D

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

What can you say
about a high-powered
exec with an
Elmo charm
on his cell phone?

By Mary Roach

r The Japanese
multibillion-dollar
character-goods industry
reaches from toys to tarmacs,
where Pokemon imps ride
AM Nippon Airways 747s, to
traditional celebrations like
the star festival Tanabata
(opposite).

ver the last year and a half, the Japanese carrier
All Nippon Airways spent upwards of a million
dollars in licensing fees and paint to decorate the
exterior of three Boeing 747s with colorful, 20-foot-
high Pocket Monsters from Pokemon, the Nintendo Game
Boy phenomenon-slash-hit cartoon-slash-just released
Warner Bros, movie-slash-merchandising blitz,The
assumption is that Japanese men and women will
line up for the opportunity to ride a jet whose fuse¬
lage, headrests, and beverage cups are decorated
with the adorable yellow what ever-he-is, Pikachu.

To anyone who knows Japan, the assumption seems
apt. There, the pull of the cute is a powerful and omni¬
present force Jhe Japanese are born into cute and raised
with cute. They grow up to save money with cute (Miffy the
bunny on Asahi Bank ATM cards), to pray with cute (Hello
Kitty charm bags at Shinto shrines), to have sex with cute
(prophylactics decorated with Monkichi the monkey, a condom
stretched over his body, entreating,"Would you protect me?").

030

They see backhoes painted to
look like giraffes and police kiosks
fixed up like gingerbread houses.
Each of Japan's 47 prefectures has
its own adorable mascot, as do
the Tokyo police and the govern¬
ment television station. Home-run-
swatting ball players are handed
a plush stuffed animal when they
cross the plate. Well-heeled city
women are dropping yen by the
millions on a Kansai Yamamoto cou¬
ture line called Super Hello Kitty,
Teenage boys tattoo themselves
with Badtz-Maru, the Sanrio com¬
pany's mischievous, lumpy-headed
penguin. Salarymen otherwise

indistinguishable with their gray
suits and cigarettes buy novelty ceil
phone straps adorned with plastic
charms of their favorite cute charac¬
ters: Thunder Bunny, Cookie Mon¬
ster, Doraemon the robot cat Cute
is everywhere.They're soaking in it

At the intersection of Japan's con¬
sumer-electronics powerhouses and
its character-goods industry lie the
rare examples of global cute - billion-
dollar sellers like Tamagotchi and
Pokemon , which combine appealing
aesthetics with an addictive com¬
puter-game experience.Though in
Japan you may be able to convince
high-functioning, self-respecting
adults that they can't live without
a toaster that browns an image of
Barbapapa into their morning slice
or that a Hello Kitty wedding is a
swell idea, in the rest of the world,
thus far, it takes a high tech hook.

This may change. Fueled by Inter¬
net subcultures, ecommerce (Hello
Kitty alone has hundreds of entries
on eBay), and the globalization of
large corporations like Sanrio,cute
is making planetary inroads. Hello

Kitty and other Sanrio perennials
are selling briskly in more than 30
countries, including Argentina,
Bahrain, and Taiwan, where a recent
merchandising tie-in with McDon¬
ald's caused scuffles among diners
waiting in line to buy Hello Kitty
plush toys. A Nintendo press release
titled It's a Pokemon Planet" informs
us that worldwide revenues from
the computer game and its mer¬
chandising peripherals are dosing
in on $5 billion - thanks in no small
part to the Internet US fans regularly
visit Japanese Pokemon Web sites to
download new Pocket Monsters,
which typically appear Stateside
a year after they debut in Japan.

The maiden voyage of ANA flight
007 leaves for Tokyo from San Fran¬
cisco International Airport in one
hour. On board the plane, a half-hour
delay is atoned for with free terry-
cloth Pikachu bean ie-stuffies. The
Japanese man in the seat beside
me, who does something involving

Mary Roach (mcroach@sirius.com)
Js a columnist for Salon,

In SH2 it even self
adults will consider a
• . Now

is making

At a Taiwan
scuffles broke out
buying

IMAGES: JUN TArfAGl; FLAVER AND PURSE; flSAM'RIO

5»MRbt

Clockwise from top: Sanrio CEO
Shintaro Tsuji in his office; Hello Kitty
headmistress Yuko Yamaguchi; Sanrio
designers display their characters,
which inspire more than 7,000 new
products a year Opposite: A Hong
Kong boy with his Happy Meal loot.

/ Introduced as a \
mascot for Sony's
email software, pink
teddyhear Memo and his
fellow PostPets have made
the Leap to mousepads
\ and cell phone J
attachments.

industrial drill bits, has unwrapped
his Pikachu and set it in his lap, so
it appears to be resting contentedly
on his balls. From my seat I took out
a window situated within the giant
Pikachu that wraps around the plane's
nose.lf you stood on the tarmac
and looked up, it would appear as
though I am inside the giant cute
thing.That - kind of - is the plan.

he Japanese word for cute
is kawaii. You often hear it
spoken alone, a sentence and
a sentiment unto itself. I heard it
first in a Tokyo train station in a
small shop devoted almost entirely
to a penguin named Pingu,a super¬
star of cute who began life as a
Swiss clay animated figure and in
Japan exploded into a diversified
line that includes pens, washcloths,
and toilet-paper covers.

“KawaiiiiiiiiFThe sound came
from a girl of perhaps 14, a plain¬
tive, drawn-out keening, equal parts
joy ("Look how cute!") and desire
("I want him!"). Minutes later, I heard
it again, from a twenty something
OL ("office lady/a uniformed cor-
porate secretary/beverage server).
This time it was more of a low groan,
as though the longing to possess
was causing a tangible ache.

The Japanese teen magazine CREA
called kawaii the most widely used,
widely loved, habitual word in mod¬
ern living Japanese." According to
Sharon Kinsella, a Cambridge Uni¬
versity researcher who has written
on the subject, the cute craze began
around 1970, when a fad for writing
notes and letters in rounded, childish
characters began to catch on among
teenage Japanese girls. Scholars who
studied the phenomenon dubbed It
Anomalous Female Teenage Hand¬
writing. Kids called it burikko-ji, trans¬
lated as "kitten-writing" or "fake-child
writing "At one point in the mid- F 80s,
some 55 percent of 12- to 18-year-
old girls were using it.

Magazines, ads, even computer
software picked up the style, which
soon broadened into a general
fashion for talking, dressing, and
acting like a child, a practice that
spawned a new verb: burikko suru t
Tofake-child-it"

Sanrio's Hello Kitty charac¬
ter, which first appeared on

Momo the PostPet - a
sort of hypercute version
of the Eudora rooster Jf
- is the first Net-spawned
character success story.

accessories for kitten-writing, has
grown into a 50-creature line of in-
house characters and goods gross¬
ing more than $1 billion a year from
sales and licensing. Though the com¬
pany faces competition from firms
that crank out Japanese goods bear¬
ing foreign cutesters (Mickey, Pingu,
theTeletubbies) and from a handful
of smaller character-design houses
like San-X and Super Planning Com¬
pany, it continues to hold its place
as top dog in the empire of cute.

The most obvious appeal of cute
to the Japanese is, in large part, the
appeal of childhood."There seems
to be this feeling of always wanting
to be at that level, of never wanting

to move on, to grow up and leave it
behind," says Yuko Yamaguchi, assis-
tant general manager of Sanrio's
character-design department.Small
wonder Japanese adulthood is,
perhaps more so than in most cul¬
tures, a time of onerous respon¬
sibility and pressure to conform.

"Childhood, in Japan, is a time
when you were given indulgences
of all kinds - mostly by your mother,
but by society too," says Boston
University anthropology professor
Merry White, author of The Material
Child: Coming of Age in Japan and
Amedeo. "We in the US are said to
be a youth society, but what we
really are is an adolescence society.

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

030

MAGES:

Sharon Kinsella,the coenotative
meanings of kawaii include help¬
lessness and vulnerability.

This is not to say that cute is an
elaborate front for girlie porn - an
estimated 90 percent of Tokyo's
character designers are women, so a
lot of it is about cute for cute's sake
- but designers of cute seem to
have an innate sense of the titilla-
tion factor,"It's not just being cute*
There is something different - a
relaxed look, powerless/says Hifcaru
Suemasa, head designer at the
Tokyo character-goods company
San-X. Suemasa is the creator of
Tarepanda ("droopy panda"),a gen¬
derless sandbag of a bear so weak
that it cannot walk, but has to roll
slowly from place to place (at 2 J5
meters per hour, according to com¬
pany literature)*

"At first we worried because it
doesn't look like it's alive/ Suemasa
recalls."8ut this turned out to be
one of the elements that made it
sell/Earnings from Tarepanda will
likely top $3 million by the end of
the year. And one of San-X's latest
designs is a huddled, visibly quiver
ing puppy with the slogan "Anoka
dakewa nigatenano" ("That kid is
hard to deal with”).

Cute appeals to product manu¬
facturers as a form of window
dressing for the uncute. Children's
prescription-drug bags and den¬
tists'offices usually have a cute

That's what everyone wants to go
back to. In Japan,it's childhood,
mother, home that is yearned for,
not the wildness of youth."

Japanese men, on whom the
pressure is strongest, also feel

the cuteness tug.Takeshi Ochi,vice
president of planning, products,
and licensing at Sony Creative
Products in Tokyo, spoke of the
tendency of Japanese men to suf¬
fer from Peter Pan syndrome and
referred to the common practice

among businessmen of reading
manga on the subway.There is, he
told me, a common Japlish expres¬
sion for arrested-development
grown-ups: adaluto chifuduren. Ochi
did not exclude himself from this
category, and made no attempt to
hide the Elmo on his cell phone
strap or his passion for the national
broadcasting company's new fuzzy
TV-head character, Mr. Hi!

Some Japanese men are drawn
more to the typical owner of cute
merchandise than to the merchan¬
dise itself,The cuteness of a gig¬
gling girl clad in a Hetlo Kitty jumper
isn't entirely innocent It ties in to
what is well known in Japan as Loli-
com,the Lolita complex.The phe¬
nomenon of the little girl as sexual
object abounds in Tokyo: Vending
machines sell schoolgirls'used
panties, which the girls sell to mid-
dlemen/Jmage bars"specialize in
escorts dressed in school uniforms.
Telephone clubs feature bored
adolescent girls earning spending
money by talking dirty. Sex shops
sell a porn magazine called Ana¬
tomical Illustrations of Junior
High School Girls .

The cute characters
themselves often display
elements of passivity and
little-girl helplessness.
They frequently lack a mouth,
for example, and have tiny, rounded

stumps for limbs. According to

character somewhere in evidence.
Sanrio licensed rights to make Hello
Kitty children's fireproof evacuation
gear and first-aid kits. In a similar
vein, Hello Kitty miniwieners have
the appealing little cat head branded
into the casings. Cuting up the kky
and the scary seems to work equally
well with Japanese adults, i bought
yogurt one day that had drawings
on the label depicting adorable
acidophilus-bacteria guys (in white)
chasing evil, horned-but-stili-
adorable fecal germs (in black) out
the end of a winding Chutes and
Ladders colon,

Japanese companies will also
resort to cuteness when they can't
otherwise gain an edge over the
competition,This is perhaps the
reason ANA painted Pocket Mon¬
sters on its 747s. ANA's prices and
service closely match those of Japan
Airlines, and JAL has Mickey, Banks
are another good example, because
interest rates - in other countries
a bank's main selling point - are
controlled by the Japanese govern¬
ment "!f there were a difference in
rates, no one would goto a bank
just because it has Snoopy on the
bank statements/says Takeshi Ochi

of Sony Crea¬
tive Products, Or
maybe they would. When
Taiwan's Makoto Bank put Hello
Kitty on its checkbooks and ATM
cards, lines of new depositors out¬
side the bank grew so Song that
other customers panicked, fearing
the bank was about to fold.

Many of the stubby little fig¬
ures that wind up megalicensed
got their start not on the sketch
pads of hired character designers
but in the heads of Japanese anime
artists. They come from comic books,
television cartoons,animated films
- art that appeals aesthetically to a
broad demographic. All age groups
in Japan watch anime. Animated
shows air not only on Saturday morn¬
ing but also during prime time.The
appetite for manga also spans gen¬
erations.Tokyo bookstores typically
have three separate sections for
manga: men's (sex and violence),
women's (romance and sex), and
children's.

While the normal life span of a
designer-drafted Sanrio or San-X
character runs only a few years -
15 or so core characters have hung
on much longer than average -
some anime-spawned characters
endure for decades, Hayao Miya¬
zaki's animated classic My Neigh¬
bor Jotoro came out 12 years
ago, but the character Totoro
still appears in character-
goods shops, adorning
chopstick cases and socks.
In some cases, the charac¬
ter endures because its TV
show endures. Doraemon

has been a weekly cartoon since
the days of black-and-white TV.
Loopy superhero Anpanman,so
named for the breakfast bun that
is his head, stars in a children's car¬
toon that counts hundreds of epi¬
sodes. Though Pokemon began as a
Game Boy title, it was the weekly TV
cartoon that powered its hydraulic
surge in popularity. Even the mighty
Hello Kitty was juiced by recent
appearances on the popular Tokyo
TV series The Love Generation ,

anrio Company Ltd, occupies
the top nine floors of an un-
cute office tower five minutes
from the Osaki train station in cen¬
tral Tokyo.Things don't start to get
cute until the 18th floor, where the
design department is,To get to
their desks, Sanrio's staff designers
must walk through"Kitty's Room,"
a mock-up of a studio apartment
furnished with Hello Kitty appli¬
ances, foods, and toiletries - almost
all of them pink.

At the moment, Kitty's Room is
sublet to a pair of live, caged ham¬
sters. These arrived last year, when
hamsters were very big. After ham¬
sters came butterflies; next year
dragons and possibly fish will be
big again. Character designers fol¬
low trends in movies, fashions, news
events.Tarepanda, for instance,
came after the Tokyo Zoo's panda
acquisition brought on a nation¬
wide craze a couple years back,

Each of

Sanrio's 50 staff artists is expected
to come up with one or two new
characters per year. Odds are they
won't be used, though, for only a
couple of new product lines are
introduced each season. Designers
spend the bulk of their time making
products to showcase existing char¬
acters. With the exception of some
of the original sketches and draw¬
ings, almost all of this work is done
on computers - Apple G3s. Design¬
ers sit at desks, not drafting tables.
At all three of the biggest firms I vis¬
ited - Sanrio, Sony Creative Products,
and San-X - the look is that of a
(cluttered) high tech office, not a
design studio.

"Six hundred new items go out
the door every month," Doug Parkes,
a manager in Sanrio's international-
iicensing department, told me.
About two-thirds of Sanrio's profit
comes from the products it designs
and then subcontracts to a factory
to produce (Sanrio owns no manu¬
facturing plants),The remaining
third comes from royalties paid by
licensees who manufacture their
own products with Sanrio charac¬
ters on them.The design staff also
spends time working with licens¬
ees. As Parkes puts it, "They may
know how to build a bicycle, but
they have no idea how to put Hello
Kitty on it."

Sanrio's main
competitors in
the Japanese

rMAGES FROM TOP- HAWAII: JOACHIM MILLER LANCE; CONDOMS: CSANRIO: CTOM WAGNEfi/SABA

rriji

fwm

iihil

i — v
• IK

>1 Jol

His head shaped tike
an artpon, or Japanese
. breakfast bun, An pan-
[ man first hit it big in
1973 as the title char¬
acter of Yanase Takashi's
popular children's cartoon.Today
he J s bigger than ever - generations
X, Y, and Z are glued to reruns and
flock to the Anpanman Museum in
Kahoku.The best English-language
Web site is www.sirius.com/~joyfm
/Anpan-ton d/A nponlan d.htm.

“ Kir

) Born on April
Fools' Day, this

bullying black penguin
J enjoys picking on stick-
in-the-muds and slorping
high-end sushi, but his
Sanrio creators insist he's "a good
guy at heart." Badtz-Maru hit North
America in 1996 and has appeared
grumpily ever since on bookbags,
pencils, T-shirts, and notepads
( www.sanrio.com },

French architect
Annette Tison and

f \ Just released in the US,

* Sanrio's Choeocat has
. been popular in Japan
I since 1996, despite his
' ghostly absence from TV
and the company's theme
parks. He's a little scatterbrained
and afraid of the dark, but he's got a
technical edge - his whiskers double
as antennas, picking up breaking
news and warning him of impending
danger {www.sanrio.com}.

\ Daniel premiered in
- 1993 as a nameless

American scientist Talus Taylor co¬
created this cuddly ectobiob back
in 1970, but only recently have
Japanese publishers like Kodansha
yanked Barbapapa and his Schmoo-
like family out of obscurity. US fans
can ride the swelling Barbawave at
www. imag inet frf-mhp,

O A new face in the Pokemon
mob, this scrappy little bull
debuted last month in Pikachu's Vaca¬
tion, the film short that precedes
screenings of Pokemon: The First
Movie. He teams up with his blue
buddy Marril to take on archenemies
Pikachu, Squirtle, and Bufbasaur {www
. upn e t workxom/m ovies_ in fo.h tmi }.

This queen of
cute reigned in
1990, when the ChibiMaruko
Chan series became the
highest-rated animated
television show in Japanese
history. Chibi, who fronts backpacks
and cell phone covers, also has her own
board game [www.sunhlngtoysxom}.

Hello Kitty Babies doll but
* ■ J didn’t hit it big until
March, when Puroland
reintroduced him as Kitty's
childhood pal/boyfriend. Daniel's US
assault started in September, but so
far he's limited to only a few major-
market store s ( www, san rio. co.jp ).

I, This cat android from
! the 22 nd century was
l created by Fujiko-F-Fujio,
j? a shared pen name for
'two designers living In
Tokyo. Doraemon packs
strange gizmos in his belly pocket, like
a magic door that leads to any desired
destination. Fan swag includes note¬
books, cameras, screensavers, and an
email server ( www.doramail.com }.

) 0ne of many mascots
created for Japanese
municipalities, this bulb¬
il ,) headed "little health guy"
is the official critter in Toyo-
shina, a town in Nagano Prefec¬
ture that specializes In growing and
packing onions. The blue of his shorts
represents fresh air and dean water.

I Probably the second
most famous Pocket
Monster after Pikachu,

\ Jiggly Puff escaped
from Pokemon Island
and into Nintendo's Super
Smash Bros , videogame last April.

He's a tough fighter, thanks to his
narcoleptic powers: He can put anyone
near him to sleep {animenetwork
.com/weddingpeach/jiggiy. html).

; This big-mouthed, tall-eared
^S^^^cat has been a Japanese
phenom since her 1989
i [) film debut In Hayao

J Miyazaki's Kiki's Deiivery
Service {Majo no Takkyubin).
Jiji is only now starting to gain popu¬
larity on this side of the Pacific. She's
available in a hard-to-find plush
doll that jiggles (www.rrausfcfl 0 .net
/miyazaki/kiki),

jThe Japanese
health ministry
commissioned these
button-bellied proto¬
types to monitor the
elderly and anyone who
l needs medical atten-
r tion. Created by Mat¬
sushita, these Furby-like
stuffed animals rely on their digital
brains and sensors to respond to
owners' moods, strike up a conversa¬
tion with a bit of local news, or pro¬
vide another party with feedback
from the patient who plays with one
of these new-millennium fuzzies.

, Star of Pokemon: The
First Movie, this lavender,
squirrel-like creature is
a bioengineered thingy
that first appeared in
the Game Boy Pokemon,
This fall's merchandise rollout includes
the usual pileup: stickers, caps, and a
series of books (www.pokemon.com),

S This fluffy, pink quasi-Gumby
was born in 1996, when
Sony launched its crew
r] of PostPet virtual email
’ J couriers. The more mail
' it delivers, the greater the
chance this gender-neutral bear has
of falling in love, quarreling, or grow¬
ing up, PostPets can be found in Japan
on digital watches and mini T-shirts
(ww w r sony, com.sg/pos tpet).

A Sanrio-product darling
since 1989, Pochatco
the dog now costars in
performances at Puroland
and Harmonyland, as well
on the TV show Kitty's

Paradise , which airs weekly on Japan's
TV Tokyo network. Pochacco walks on
two legs, has a weakness for banana
ice cream, and Is known as a busy¬
body ( www.sanrh.com ).

j This "cabbit" - a cross
between a cat and a
rabbit - not only meows and munches
carrots but can also walk through
walls and has a laser-
emitting gem on
her forehead.

(Bonus: She can
turn herself into a space¬
ship.) The fuzziest
character from
designer Kajishima
Masaki's revered animeTV series
Tenchi Muyo , she's available as a pop¬
ular plush toy {www.geocities.com
/Tokyo/7b wers/6075/i-ryo-ohki. h tmi).

I With his big-screen debut
in Pok&mon: The First
Movie , Togepi graduates
j from TV to become a
■ full-fledged game charac¬
ter in the new Pokemon
Silver and Gold series. A favorite
since he hatched in the television
episode "Attack of the Prehistoric
Pokemon" earlier this year, this egg-
shaped creature is available as a
plush squeezie from Hasbro (www
.pokemon.com).

Totoro (mispronounced
V J Japanese for "troll"} has
been referred to on fan Web sites
as a "rabbitlike spirit" and "a giant
furry thing." The
guardian of the
forest in the 1988
children's classic
My Neighbor
Totoro {Tonari
no Totoro), Totoro
appears only before unjaded
children, and disappears without
warning. The plush version, the
biggest-selling stuffed toy in the
history of Japan, is available through¬
out the US ( www.nausicaa.net
/ miyazaki/totoro ).

- Patricia Krueger

Ha®

WIRED DECEMBER 1 999

character industry -Walt Disney
Enterprises Japan and Sony Creative
Products - differ from Sanrio in that
they don't design their own charac¬
ters, but rather art as brokers for
existing imps, managing the licens¬
ing of dozens of US and European
characters. Sony Creative handles
Sesame Street's denizens (who enjoy
phenomena! popularity among
Japanese adults), Pingu, Nick Park's
Wallace and Gromit, and Thunder
Bunny and other characters by New
York illustrator Rodney Alan Green-
blat,as well as a couple of domestic
designs - most notably (for now,
anyway) Sony's Momo the PostPet.

The naughty-sweet pink bear -
a sort of hypercute version of the
Eudora rooster - is the first Internet-
spawned character-licensing suc¬
cess story. He has of late made the
leap to fax memos, mousepads,and,
of course, cel I phone straps, Sanrio
used to handle Japanese licensing
of Betty Boop and the Pink Panther,
among others, and if Hello Kitty
hadn't proved to be the juggernaut
she is, no doubt Sanrio would have
continued doing so.
n've come to Sanrio to meet Yiiko
Yamaguchi, the designer tn charge
of H^llo Kitty for 19 of the characters

25 years. We are not meeting in her
office, for she has no office. No one
on her floor does; nor do they have
cubicles. As is typical of Japanese
corporations, employees work in
clusters of open desktops, the
elbow of one woman jutting into
the airspace of her neighbor. What¬
ever space remains after the G3
and the mousepad take their bite
is given over to an eye-assaulting
welter of cute-character stuff -
some of it practical (staplers,
erasers), most just cute. They
are stuck on monitor frames,
crowded three deep on shelf
edges, hung on strings from
desk lamps.

Yamaguchi and I are
talking in a small confer¬
ence room, accompanied by
Doug Parkes, who serves as
our interpreter,and a blue-
suited man from the Gen¬
eral Affairs office, whose
role is unclear to me.

The atmosphere is a
good deal more sober
thahd'd anticipated. I take

Sony's PaRapper alarm dock and
Super Planning's Mr Friendly
knapsack (above and right);
Tarepanda (opposite) dreams
of getting the attention
lavished on Pingu.

solace in the chair cushions,
which are red and printed to
read,“Hello, lovely to meet you. I'm
Kitty. I've invited all my best friends
to come and play/'

1 have asked Yamaguchi why so
many^ute Japanese characters
have no mouth. At Sanrio alone,
the muted legions include
Hello Kitty, Pochacco, Cathy
the bunny, fslutz, Chococat,
and Cookie-Bau. Might this
fit in with the helpless
aspect of kawattf If submis-
siveness is part of the appeal
of cute, what better than to
have no mouth at all?

./Kitty bds a mouth,''Yamaguchi
states flatly. Spread open on the
table is an issue of the glossy mag a-
zine/cata Iog Kitty Goods Collection ,
l look again:The damn cat has no
mouth.

"It's hidden in the fur," Yamaguchi
insists.

"But -*

"She has one,"

The women who create cute are
nothing like the women you see
buying it. San-X's Hikaru Suemasa,
when we meet, is dressed in black
bell-bottoms and a T-shirt, her bare
feet slipped into plastic sandals.
Yamaguchi, easily 40, is wearing
kneesocks, but they're black. Her
hair is infused with strands of a
deep Goth red

their way of saying I can't talk to
him.Tajirt grants no interviews, but
is generally reported to have drawn
his inspiration for Pokemon from
monster movies and an insect¬
collecting hobby in his youth, A
Nintendo flack says Tajiri is "proba¬
bly the most creative person in the
world" and "equally eccentric."

Yamaguchi and her bland, benign
Kitty make a decidedly odd couple.
And a couple they clearly are.
She describes a phase sev¬
eral years back during
which "Kitty and I
were basically parts
of each other." What¬
ever Yamaguchi did
or dreamed of doing -
she briefly wanted to be
a model, for instance-
Kitty would also do, and
vice versa."At one point,
Kitty started collecting
teddy bears. I found
I had to, too," she says.

Hello Kitty
Homme, Sanrio's
new line of menswear,
features Kitty's decapitated
noggin shrunk to the size of

a polka dot.

you will find on no Sanrio product.
She doesn't giggle. Beneath her
skirt, she wears a kind of black
woven pantaloons, a fact I am privy
to because she sits with her legs
planted well apart.

Satoshi Tajiri, 33-year-old creator
of Pikachu and pals, is apparently
cut from the same cloth. (Nintendo
bought rights to the Pokemon story
from Tajiri's Tokyo-based company.
Game Freaks.) Officials at Nintendo
of America's corporate affairs office
describe Tajiri as "reclusive, "which is

These days, Yamaguchi sees the
relationship as one of idol and
manager.

Indeed, teenage girls in Japan
treat characters the way they do
celebrities, writing them fan letters
and covering their walls with the
icons'images. Yamaguchi tells me
she modeled Kitty's boyfriend, Dear
Daniel, after 16-year-old Japanese
pop cover boy Takizawa. Appar¬
ently it worked Sales wise, since
his launch in April, Daniel has been
coming on strong."The girls are

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

040

IMAGES FROM LEFti OSONY; CSUPEft PLANNING COMPANY LTD.

IMAGES FHOM TOP: CHAHLIt COLE/Sl PA ; *5aN-K

idolizing him,"Yamaguchi says.

Yamaguchi explains why Sanrio
characters tend to lack necks and
mouths and sport near-vestigial
arms and legs: Cute is as cute does.
If a character needs to do nothing
more than increase the appeal of a
hair clip or wallet, it has no need for
legs or neck or anything to dilute
the basic elements of cute: round,
little,simple, lovable,The current
look of Hello Kitty merchandise
takes this basic formula a step fur¬
ther, reducing the feline to a bow-
bedecked head.

"What's happening is, it's becom¬
ing more of a logo/" interjects the
General Affairs man, Kazuo Toh-
matsu."We are using this for the
new line of Hello Kitty um ..."He
blinks. I lean closer, eager to hear
what the newest line might be.
Having burned through the kit¬
chen (Hello Kitty eggs, ice-cube
trays, coffeemakers), the office
(Hello Kitty laminators, postage
scales, paper shredders), the bath¬
room (Hello Kitty toe-jam brushes!),
the beach, and the boudoir, Sanrio
has made its way to the outer

noggin shrunk to the size of a polka
dot. Kawaii! I will bring home boxer
shorts for my homme.

ou do not have to look care¬
fully to find the cute in Shin-
taro Tsuji's life.The Sanrio
CEO's office windows are papered
with giant, peeking-tn Hello Kitty
heads that block the view of Mount
Fuji and make it appear as if the
poor feline had been thrown out¬
side and had clawed her way up 20
floors of concrete in an attempt to
get back in.The back half ofTsuji's
desk is blanketed with Sanrio para¬
phernalia, a thick, pastel moss of
cute. In among the rabbits and pan¬
das and frogs is the planet's one
and only Hello Kitty ashtray - a
handmade gift; cigarettes and hard
liquor are no-fly zones at Sanrio.
Each month, under the pen name
Strawberry King, 71 -year-old Tsuji
writes the opening message to
subscribers of the Sanrio fanzine
The Strawberry News.

Along with Tsuji's office, the
20th floor contains -1 don't know
why - a suite of rooms laid out like

Something CUte gets you

here," says Sanrio's Tsuji,
pounding his sternum.

"if only I could make a

Hello Kitty
smart bomb."

7). ;ipy!Mln!Wk;yi

a house. Doug Parkes and I wait in
the "living room"for Tsuji to arrive.
Visible through an open doorway is,
the "bathroom," wherein a Victorian
daw-foot tub, a sink, and a toilet
have been set down on the carpet,
but not installed."Don't use it,
please," says Parkes in a tone that
suggests that someone, at some
point, did.

Like the characters he has'shep-
herded to market, Shintaro Tsuji is
small and charming and difficult
to dislike. He wears a dark ulue
business suit with a Hello kitty
pin in the la pel. This afternoon, he
wants to talk about "social commu¬
nication," invariably the topic of his
Strawberry King essays:This preoc¬
cupation is the reason "Hello" was
tacked onto "Kitty," (Hi Kittyjsuji's
first choice,"didn't quite dido®
Sanrio products were originally
intended to be given as presents
that say, "I tike you. You're my friend.”

A smart move on Tsuji's part,
given the Japanese penchant for
social gift-giving. Some journalists
in Japan, 1 recently learned, by cus¬
tom present their interviewees with
a little token that says,"! like you.
You're my material," I had picked
up a Felix the Cat T-shirt for Tsuji,
thinking he would enjoy seeing an
American kitty-cat character. When
I learned that Sanrio used to license
the rights to produce Felix the Cat
merchandise in Japan, I gave the

shoals of character merchandising:
Hello Kitty condos, cars, and large
appliances.

"And what is the new line?"

I ask.

"Um ... Hello Kitty
um..."

Doug Parkes interrupts.

"He's saying bomme. As in
French for man." Hello Kitty
Homme is Sanrio's new line of
menswear and accessories in
navy blue, burgundy, gray, and
black, with Kitty's decapitated

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

shirt to the woman at my hotel
desk, who said"Pussy!"and bowed
deeply.

Tsuji explains why cute is always
appropriate in gifts."A formal gift
makes you stiffen up/* he says. It
may make the receiver feel a need
to return the favor. Something
humorous is like you're making fun
of the person. It's hard to maintain
friendships if you're giving them
skeleton heads and silly things.
Something cute/'he pounds his
sternum with his fist, "gets you
right here/'

Tsuji is quiet for a moment and
then he raises the topic of Kosovo.
Parkes begins to look uncomfort¬
able. "MrJsuji says,'If only I could
come up with a Hello Kitty smart
bomb.'"Then Parkes adds,"To put
good feeling in the hearts of the
soldiers "I can't tell whether it's
Tsuji's addendum or his own.

Sanrio will grant licensing rights
to just about anyone who applies,
drawing the line only at guns,
hard liquor, and "sharp or pointed
objects "(A recent application to
make a Hello Kitty paper cutter was
turned down.) At the other extreme
you have character-licensing house
Dick Bruna Japan, trying desperately
to sequester children's book hero
Miffy the rabbit within the realm of
children's goods and turning down
a dozen licensee applications a
month.

In between are companies tike
San-X, which picks and chooses
according to some ineffable inter-
nal logic. Its Tarepanda graces the

wrapper of a common Tokyo toilet-
paper brand, but San-X rejected a
condom company's application.

Still, with some 15,000 products
bearing Sanrio characters, market
saturation threatens. When you
have characters on eggs and digital
pianos and bikini bottoms, it's safe
to say you're nearing the last chap¬
ter. And so Sanrio is shifting its
focus from things to placesJapan
now has Hello Kitty batting cages,
restaurants, condo-design packages,
at least one karaoke bar, and, most
of all, Purofand.

Sanrio built its first theme park in
1990 in the urban-suburban sprawl
that surrounds Tokyo. It remains one
of Japan's most popular attractions.
My host is £iji Ogiyama, Puroland's
giddy, portly assistant manager of
sales. He has Hello Kitty on his wal¬
let, and I am about to see that this is
not just an accessory, but a metaphor.
Though the theme park lost money
Its first three years, owing to opera¬
tional foul-ups and a temporary lull
in Hello Kitty's popularity, it's making
up quickly for its losses. An estimated
20,000 people visit the park each
weekend, at $40 a head.Then there
are concessions, souvenirs, and
miscellaneous purchases, this last
attended to with a thoroughness
most impressive.

Our tour begins at the Wisdom
Tree Stage, where boys and girls,
wearing smocks patterned with
their favorite Sanrio character,
parade around a magic tree.The
park loans out the smocks and
paper crowns, takes a picture, and
charges 300 to 400 yen for each
child.That's $3 to $4 apiece."Could
be 500," says Ogiyama,"f forget."
From here, we move upstairs
to marvel at the Hello Kitty
Bell of Happiness.The bell's
frame and the surrounding
walls are papered with
handwritten wishes. A
nearby vending machine
sells plastic capsules
containing official Bell
of Happiness wish-writing

paper for 500 yen. Ogiyama is grin¬
ning, his hair flopping forward onto
his forehead/'Flve hundred million
yen just from this!"

Back downstairs, we tour Hello
Kitty's House, which the feline
shares with her beau Dear Daniel
("separate bedrooms/'Ogiyama
assures me). The exit deposits visi¬
tors in one of four gift shops. "After
you love Kitty, you come out here
and buy so much stuff! You know
how the young Japanese adults
love the cutesy stuff!"

he Pokemon jet is flying low
on its approach to San Fran¬
cisco. Below us is the drab
mosaic of warehouses that is South
San Francisco's Cabot, Cabot &
Forbes Industrial Park. One of them
rivals a soccer stadium in square
footage. This is Sanrio's distribution
point for the Western Hemisphere,
f'm told that it's one of the largest
buildings on the West Coast.

Thus far, cute is kid stuff in the US,
and even then it's not the candy-to-
a-baby affair it is in Japan. American
kids demand to be entertained; cute
is a secondary selling point. Sanrio
takes this into consideration in
designing goods for the American
market."American girls like moving
action-type characters," says Mari
Yakushiji, Sanrio's Tokyo-based head
of design for US products. Pochacco,
Sanrio's "sports-minded pup," is a
flat-liner in Japan but a top selier in
America. If Pikachu had been intro¬
duced in the US simply as something
adorable to gaze at on a notebook
cover, rather than as a computer-
game character, he wouldn't be the
hit he is. And he wouldn't appeal
to boys.

It's boys I see a few weeks later
at the Bay Area stop of the 1999
Pokemon League Summer Training
Tour, held in San Rafael, California's
Northgate Mall. Just past the Pierc¬
ing Pagoda and down the hall from
the Pokemon Cable Club, where
novices pick up game tips, are three
folding tables set up end to end:

the staging area for the
Poke Cup Tournament.

Eight pairs of competitors
face off across the tables;
only one player is a girl. A
black cable links each pair's
Game Boys. A woman behind
me with a microphone headset is
shouting,"You learned a new move!
You learned Tail Whip!"

At the signal to begin, the boys
[and token girl) drop their heads
and fall silent, motionless but for
their twitching thumbs. Watching a
Pokemon tournament is like watch¬
ing grace at Thanksgiving dinner.
Nonetheless, it's clearly a battle.

No one talks about how cute their
Bulbasaurs are or how they love the
pink curly horn (hair? trunk?) on
Jtggly Puff's forehead. It's all Tackles
and Cuts and Poison Stings and
Tail Whips, the sorts of things that
would send Miffy running for the
rabbit hole.

The further you get from elemen¬
tary school, I suspect, the heavier
the American resistance will be to
cute in its purest incarnation. It's
hard to imagine US teenagers deem¬
ing it cool to own a Thunder Bunny
cell phone case or a boogie board
graced by Badtz-Maru's visage,and
harder still to picture middle man¬
agers in Hello Kitty dress socks.
(Sanrio is trying to hit that market
all the same - the company opened
its first US adult-merchandise store,
Vivitix, in October in Berkeley,Cali¬
fornia.) For that you must go to
Japan. And when you go, you must
bring me back a Hello Kitty toe-jam
brush.! ■ ■

WIRED DECEMBER 1 9 3 9

040

IMAGE (OPPOSITE PAGE]: WILLIAM FAULKNER

—

Cute is slowly creeping
under American skin; a
29-year-old San Francisco
collector shows off his
tattoos and then some.

BREAKING

BY NICK M0NTF0RT 1LLUSTRAT10N BY LINDA NYE

60000000

G5A0591A

10800000

00000000

00080800

200C417A

00000000

QOQQOOOD

12800002

As the last (fays of 1999 tick off and the mother of all
bug fixes is in its final hours, the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF), networking managers, and backbone
operators are beginning another heroic netware upgrade:
the switch to IPv6,

The Internet Protocol was born in the 1970s, as the
Net began spreading beyond Darpa into academia and
private-sector R&D labs, and has become standard for
routing data. According to Vint Cerf, the Internet - or
actually its predecessor, Arpanet - burned through the
first three versions of IP back in the early days. Today,
most packet headers start with a 4, signifying IPv4, our
current standard. The 6 in the header pictured here will
replace the 4 as IPv6 is established, (IPvS, now retired,
was an experimental protocol,)

In 1996 the IETF began testing an IPv6 prototype,
called 6BONE, now running on roughly 450 sites in 42

countries, Apple, DEC, IBM, Novell, Sun, and others are
already churning out lPv6-ready machines and servers
{not surprisingly, Microsoft is cagey about whether it
plans to integrate IPv6 with Windows 2000), And in July,
the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority officially agreed
to let network admins start allocating IPv6 addresses.

Yet some, such as Steve Deering, a lead IPv6 designer,
believe that old standards die hard, and binary buttresses
to IPv4 could keep the current protocol limping along
for decades. In the meantime, the IETF has announced
a contingency plan - an interim standard called Realm
Specific Internet Protocol, which smooths out some of
IPv4's kinks. But RSIP is just a stopgap and has yet to be
implemented. The most likely scenario will be a gradual
move to IPv6 over the next 5 to 10 years, with both IPv4
and IPv6 (and possibly RSIP) functioning at the same time
until machines running the earlier standard fizzle out.

ell

80000000

05AG59IA
10800000
00000000
00080300
200C417A
00000000
00000000
00000000
12800001

Twenty years ago, the Internet's forebears
surely never imagined today's fat streaming-
media files, which is probably why the current
protocol peppers real-time multimedia audio
and video downloads with snaps, crackles,
and pops. IPv6 not only enhances streaming
but provides for crystal-dear voice-over-IP,
The traffic class, designated in the first
two Os, is where IPv6 ensures that when the
network clogs, routers won't chop up crucial
bits of real-time streams into multiple packets.
Instead of receiving the first half of the
stream and losing the second half -
something you've surely experienced when
a RealAudio broadcast drops out midsentence
- IPv6 gives you the whole stream at one-
half quality. That sounds like a drawback, but
if you r re using voke-over-IP, it means you can
depend on the network to not cut off your
phone call during heavy traffic.

The remaining five digits represent the flow
label, which tags all the packets that belong
to a single stream of audio. As streaming
data arrives at your PC, IPv6's flow label and
traffic class combine forces: The flow label
links all the packets in a stream, and the
traffic class tells routers to let the whole
bunch pass through at the same time.

. 60000000
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10800000
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12800001

60000000

G5A0591A
l|8d0Q00.
00000QQC *

i 200C417A
' 000000DO
OOOGOO.OG
00000000
18800001:

This is the payload length, which is the size
of the packet. Theoretically, in both IPv4 and
IPv6, this field allows packets to be as big
as 64K. But in practice, most servers are
configured to divide data into 1,500-byte
chunks so that they can pass through the
narrow pipes of Ethernets. There's no
difference between the way IPv4 and IPv6
use this data.

These numbers indicate the type of the next
header. In IPv6, additional headers may
appear between the header dissected here
and the payload. These headers allow IPv6 to
perform authentication and encryption at the
packet level. Security can become ubiquitous
- a property of the network, not merely
a special mode. IPv6's authentication will
put an end to spoofing, in which hackers
dupe secure servers into believing the
intruder is someone With authorized access.
To authenticate a message, the sending node
computes a sum using a secret key. This sum
then goes into IPv6's authentication header.
When the packet arrives, IPv6 calculates the
sum, then compares the result to make sure
it hasn't been hacked en route.

Currently, encryption - when it's done at
all - happens at the application level: Two
techies exchange PGP-encrypted email, for
instance. But IPv6 r s Encapsulating Security
Payload protects personal email against
packet sniffing, even for those who don't use
PGP. ESP leaves the header as plaintext and
encrypts everything else, including all the
actual data. In a corporate intranet with
nodes around the world, ESP can construct
an additional outer wall of security by
wrapping the original packet in a second
layer of encryption. As the packet travels
across the Net, the final destination and
source addresses remain invisible. To get
where it's going, the packet simply reveals
the address of a machine on the outskirts of
a company's network. Only when the packet
gets handed off to the corporate intranet is
it decrypted and routed to the recipient.

This superstrong security involves a lot of
overhead in terms of number crunching. But
it creates an almost impenetrable barrier,
known as a steel pipe, securely linking
corporate firewalls for a lot less money
than a virtual private network.

60000000

05A0591A

10800000

00000000

00080300

200C417A

00000000

OOOGOOQO

12800001

Routing errors can bounce packets
aimlessly around the Net To prevent
such situations from dogging the
backbone, each router subtracts 1 from
this number, called the hop limit, every
time it handles a packet, if the hop limit
reaches 0, the packet expires, and the
user may get an error message. The
highest hop limit for IPv6 is 255 -
the same as for IPv4. Why 2SS? Each
character is equivalent to 4 bits, and
255 is the largest number that, in
binary, fits into 8 bits.

Sometimes a packet makes a hop
along a particularly narrow path, if
a packet is too big, the data can still get
through, but the whole thing can't go at

once. Just as an oversize supertanker
approaching the Panama Canal must
disgorge its load into several smaller
ships to get everything through,
a packet encountering a narrow path
has to fragment its data into a number
of smaller bundles. In IPv4, this
fragmentation occurs whenever a packet
reaches a bottleneck. The packet may get
broken up several times as it encounters
progressively narrower network paths.

In IPv6, the sending node finds the
narrowest point on the entire path at
the start by sending test transmissions,
so fragmentation and reassembly (which
take time and processing power) occur
only once.

Nick Montfort (nickmPmedia
.mit.edu), a writer living in
Manhattan , recently completed
Winchester's Nightmare, a novel-
length work of interactive fiction.

60000000

G5AG591A

10800000

00000000

00080800

200C417A

00000000

12800001

This is the source address, which identifies the sending
computer and underlies those familiar domain names, such
as wired.com. It's also where IPv6 has some of its greatest
(and most hyped) advantages over the current protocol.

Every networked device has a four-part numerical code, or
IP address - the Internet equivalent of a snail-mail address.
Whenever you upload a GIF to a Web page or download an
email, the binary road map stored in the header carefully
guides the bits through cyberspace to their destination.

The 32-bit addresses in IPv4 allow for more than 4 billion
addresses. This may seem like a lot, but when the Network
Information Center doled out addresses in the early 1980s
and '90s, organizations like AT&T and MIT received more
than 16 million apiece. Now, as more and more devices hit
the market online-ready, IP addresses are becoming scarce.
Half the total available addresses have already been
assigned; some say we could run dry in five years.

5ince the IETF confronted the problem in 199G, several
band-aids (allocating addresses temporarily to computers
that only dial into networks via modem, for instance) have
fended off crisis. But as we slowly run out of available
addresses, smaller networks could be cut off from the
backbone abruptly. Home workers who dial in may not be

able to get an IP address when they want to log on.

The 128-bit header in IPv6 makes for a tremendously
expanded range of addresses. If you could fit all the IPv4
addresses in a space the size of a BB, a sphere encompassing
all the new IPv6 addresses would easily eclipse the moon.

Another benefit is IPv6's autoconfiguration, which lets
computers assign themselves a permanent IP address. IPv4
forces IT managers to assign new IP addresses to every node
on the network whenever a company switches ISPs. Dynamic
Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) partially automates this
task, and Network Address Translators (NAT) can redirect
packets to nodes behind corporate firewalls using a generic
front-door IP address. But DHCP requires lengthy setup time
and continual maintenance, and NATs gum up the Net by
adding an extra processing step.

To use a telephone analogy, IPv6 eliminates extensions
and gives every user their own direct line. However, this also
potentially eliminates online anonymity by including in the
address space the manufacturer of your PC's network card
and your 48-bit Ethernet address. Privacy groups, of course,
are pressing the IETF to revamp the autoconfiguration
architecture, as well as to refuse to support wiretapping
or related law enforcement activities.

60000000

G5A0591A

10800000

00000000

00080800

200C417A

OOODO0GO

00000000

12800001

The destination address starts with a lot of Os.
That's because an IPv6 machine is sending this
packet to an older computer that still uses the
shorter IPv4 addresses.

IPv4 computers will stick around long after
most of the world upgrades to the newer
protocol, but machines on these networks will
need Network Address Translators to talk to the
rest of the Net. Otherwise, the older networks -
dubbed IPv4 "clouds" - won't be able to handle
the long IPv6 addresses. Even with the help of
NATs, IPv4 clouds won't benefit from IPu6's

remarkable enhancements, such as packet-level
encryption - unless users add more NATs for
each ad hoc upgrade.

The new protocol also lets backbone designers
create more expandable hierarchical addressing.
Much like the US telephone system, in which
three-digit area codes forward long distance
calls to local exchanges, IPv6 backbone routers
relay packets using a prefix embedded in the
destination address, instead of having to revise
and store information continually for every
network in the world. # m a

3 n 7

iwLn

More information about Schulke is available at www.f 1i pphoto.com.
An exhibit of his work T Martin Luther King Jr. Remembered, runs
through February at the Center for American Histotj at the University
of Texas at A iistin: +1 (512) 495 4515, w ww. lib.utexas.edu/Li bs/GAH,

Choose a pivotal moment, cultural or political, of the past half-century*
and chances are the image that springs to mind was taken by Flip
Schulke. We’ve all seen the world through the eyes of this photo jour¬
nalist, who began shooting for Life in the mid J 50s and contributed to
Ebony, National Geographic, and many other mags over the decades.

Schulke is placing his archive of 500,000-plus images - including
11,000 related to Martin Luther King Jr. and the Southern civil rights
movement - at the Center for American History at the University of
Texas at Austin. Thanks to a novel collaborative effort, some 9,000
of his pictures and recollections will be digitized on CD-ROM.

The archive, one of the world's most inspiring private image col¬
lections, illustrates the power and beauty of classic photojournalism.
But Schulke is more focused on teaching history itself. Initially, at
least, only UT students will have access to this new national treasure,
though Schu Ike’s dream is that eventually all schools will. “History is
often made available only in words or expensive coffee-table books,”
notes the 69-year-oM, who regularly visits schools with slides and
anecdotes. “Young people want to know. Their minds are grasping”
Thanks to Schulke, a bit of history's now within reach, ■ ■ ■

I n the attention economy, where time is more valuable than money,
it's not easy getting the world's top businesspeople and policymakers
face-to-face.Throw in the specter of conference glut, and persuading
movers and shakers to add firm commitments to their already overloaded
schedules becomes an awesome logistical and diplomatic challenge,

Klaus Schwab, the 61-year-old founder of the Davos Annual Meeting,
knows this better than most. Every winter for over two decades, he's man¬
aged to draw a cross section of the global elite to a remote Alpine valley in
SwitzeriandThere, in the secluded avalanche-prone splendor of a town that
doesn't have an airport, hundreds of the planet's most famous and influential
dealmakers, politicians, academics, media captains, intellectuals, and reli¬
gious leaders coalesce into a kind of central committee for the 21st century.

In all, roughly 2,000 attendees roam among 300-plus formal lectures, pan¬
els, and discussions - covering everything from "What's Next in Personal Com¬
puting" to "What Is a Human Being?" - before moving on to cocktail parties,
dinners, and the steady pursuit of new opportunity. Increasingly, the buzz at
Davos is about high tech. In recent years, so many hardware, software, and
Internet titans have been invited that some old-timers complain they suck the
air out of the room. By this point, Michael Dertouzos, head of MIT's Laboratory
for Computer Science, is approaching old-timer status - he first went to Davos
in 1990 - while people like eBay's Meg Whitman, Linux inventor Linus Torvalds,

KLAUS SCHWAB, MASTERMIND OF THE WORLD
ECONOMIC FORUM AND ITS DAVOS CONFAB,
HAS BUILT THE STICKIEST SITE ON THE PLANET.

BY ORVILLE SCHELL
PHOTOGRAPHS BY DANA LIXENBERG

Yahool'slim Koogle, and Jeff Bezos fall into the arriviste category.

The epicenter of the meeting is the Davos Congress Centre, but much of
the networking action occurs at the surrounding hotels - particularly the
Hotel Seehof, one of the largest and best-appointed places in town. Once
frequented by conventioneering German dentists, European skiers,and an
occasional notable, the Seehof still has a provincial air. But nothing has been
the same since the World Economic Forum, the Geneva-based umbrella
organization for the Annual Meeting, picked Davos as its gathering spot.
The Seehof and other inns have been reborn as millennial staging grounds.

"For six days, Davos is the center of the world/'says Christoph Schlosser,
the Seehof's cheerful 38-year-old manager, who showed me around last
summer."We will have Ted Turner and Bill Gates getting together just like
family in the bar, and then in will come Amre Moussa, Egypt's foreign
minister, to have a drink with Rosario Green, Mexico's foreign minister."

Orville Schell (journal ismdean^hotmaiLcom) is dean of the Graduate School of
Journalism at UC Berkeley. He is the author of many articles and books, the latest
of which is Virtual Tibet (Holt/Metropolitan, spring 2000).

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

Klaus Schwab, party animat, at the WEF
HQ in Geneva. Thanks to his vision, Davos
is "the mecca for all power net workers.^

Nelson Mandela has bunked at the Seehof. So have Hillary Clinton,
Canadian prime minister Jean Chretien, Monacal Prince Albert, Sweden's
Queen Silvia, and Jacques Cousteau.

"During the forum, we have up to 90 functions, one right after the
other/'says Schlosser/Our staff works 18-hour days, but I'm not allowed
to hire extra people because of the security problems. Every 5 feet around
the hotel we have a police officer. And we have sharpshooters on the roof
and on the apartment balconies behind the hotel.”

In the Restaurant Palais, just off the main lobby, Schlosser stops to show
me a little brass plaque on the wall commemorating the pivotal meeting
at Davos of Yasser Arafat and Shimon Peres, It reads: the world was hoping

FOR PEACE FROM DAVOS JANUARY 25-30,1994.

"And when they came back in 1996, do you know what Peres did?" says
Schlosser."He asked if we could set up the same meeting room just as it
had been,Then, for old time's sake, he invited Arafat, and the two of them
went back in just to renew their friendship.

"As people start checking in and spontaneously meeting each other, the
lobby just gets crazy,” he continues, barely able to contain his delight. "One
day, after I introduced Peres to Warren Beatty, Peres came back a moment
later and asked me in a whisper,'Who is that guy?'When I told him, he looked
really surprised and then went right back over to Beatty to ask if he wanted
to have a drink. They were in the bar for two hours. That's the spirit of Davos!”

t he man who put Davos on the map is hardly a household name, but
his famous gathering has made him as influential as many heads of
state and corporate chieftains. Over the past three decades, Klaus
Schwab has transformed a simple insight - that the major players in our
globalized era couid benefit from a convivial, neutral spot to meet and
discuss the future - into a full-biown phenomenon. London's Sunday
Telegraph has called Davos "the mecca for all power networkers," but what¬
ever description you apply, consensus among bigwigs is that you skip
Davos at your own risk,

"Each year, I say/Noi I'm not going - they all take themselves too seri¬
ously/" says financial news giant Michael Bloomberg with a chuckle,"And
then each year I go. And I have a good time.”

"In the parlance of the Internet, Davos is an aggregator/'says Kim Clark,
dean of the Harvard Business School and a Davos regular."They foresee
and hold discussions about important, emerging world trends, but another
reason to be there is the interaction.There's a kind of hunger on the part of
world leaders to really connect, and Davos is the premier networking event."

Schwab aims to create a bazaarlike atmosphere for businesspeople and
leaders to work things out off the public stage. During the carefully nur¬
tured time off from formal events, participants troll the Congress Centre
hallways in a deal-making mood, go off in small packs to ski, gather in the
blue haze of a Euro-dominated smoking bar, or just hang around compar¬
ing notes, A gaggle of Americans collect at the telecommunications warren
- an info hub on the mezzanine level of the Congress Centre, full of booths
outfitted with phone and data connections - to complain about the Nean¬
derthal phone service in their hotels. People navigating a dozen languages
compare hardware, swap jacks, and gossip while downloading email. Pri¬
vate high-level meetings go hand in hand with choreographed fun: tango
bands, sleigh rides for spouses, a Saturday-night blowout.

Schwab seems an unlikely candidate for becoming one of the century's
great party-givers. A slender, balding man with a Calvinist expression - he
reminds you of the pitchfork-clutching farmer in American Gothic- Schwab

was born in Ravensburg, Germany/in 1938. Until the late 60s, he sedately
taught business management. His academic pedigree includes degrees
from the University of Fribourg and the Swiss Federal Institute of Tech¬
nology at Zurich as well as a stint at Harvard's John F, Kennedy School of
Government. He remains a professor of business policy at the University of
Geneva, a title that prominently adorns his calling card.

Schwab conceived of the Davos gathering in 1969, a time when the
town was known mostly for its ski trails and tuberculosis wards. (One of
these was where Thomas Mann's wife took the cure in 1912, an experience
that inspired him to write The Magic Mountain.) In January 1971, Schwab was
stunned when some 450 people signed up for his two-week symposium to
discuss the challenges facing European businesses in the global marketplace.
The profit enabled him to set up the European Management Forum and
hold another session in 1972.

Growth came quickly after that. By 1973, Schwab began planning annual
events of an increasingly international cast In 1976, when he persuaded
several banks to fund a conference of Arab and European business leaders,
he drew some 2,000 participants. In 1978, Schwab's group changed its
name to the World Economic Forum. By 1990, Davos had become synony¬
mous with high-level cross-pollination. It was a place where Polish dissi-

Davos '99* This page,
clockwise from top left:

Jane Fonda and Ted Turner;
then-Indonesian finance minister Ginandjar Kartasasmita; Bill Gates;

Hillary Clinton; Nelson Mandela; UN commissioner Mary Robinson and
DuPont's Charles Holliday; Michael Dell. Opposite page, clockwise from
bottom right: Newt Gingrich; Yasser Arafat and Shimon Peres; US Federal
Reserve governor Roger Ferguson, Israeli trade minister Natan Sharansky,
and US commerce secretary William Daley; then-Russian prime minister
Yevgeny Primakov; author Nadine Gordimer; Jeff Bezos; Michael Bloomberg.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

of global businesses started vying for corporate membership, a distinction
whose number Schwab limits to 1,000. A company must have a billion-
dollar turnover to be eligible, and then must pony up about $13,500 in
annual dues plus $7,700 to send a representative to Davos.

Is the price too stiff?"! cannot afford not to go,"one US corporate leader
told me. Indeed, in the last few years, the event has gained such prestige
that many corporate heads would pay almost any price to be invited.To be
on Schwab's list is to be legitimized as a global player.To be left off is
almost an indignity.

There are, of course, other elite gatherings that contend with Davos, like
those organized by the Aspen Institute, the Bohemian Club, the Bilderberg
group,and Herb Allen's summertime schmoozefest in Sun Valley, Idaho.
Though Davos is preeminent - and more ambitious in size and scope -
its status is provisional, always dependent on the edifice of cachet that
Schwab has built In this sense, the WEF's success is as perishable as that
of any fashionable restaurant, whose popularity derives as much from its
celebrated clientele as from its cuisine. Indeed, some observers have
unfalteringly compared Schwab's position at the WEF to that of a maTtre d'
Schwab is sensitive about any suggestion that he's merely a concierge to the
mighty, but he is also keenly and aggressively aware of the crucial role he
plays in keeping the WEF together, not to mention keeping it in fashion.

dent and Solidarity champion Adam Michnlk sat down for breakfast with
his former jailer, Wojciech Jaruzetski; where Singapore senior minister Lee
Kuan Yew, World Bank president Barber Conable, and Mexico's president,
Carlos Salinas de Gortari, could hold forth alongside Swiss theologian Hans
Kung.Out of this vortex of politics, power, money, intellect, and celebrity
evolved Schwab's view that the annual meeting needed to dedicate itself
to "integrating leaders from business, government, and academia into a
partnership committed to improving the state of the world." By the mid-
'90s, as Davos ideals began to reverberate in the corridors of power, heads

THOUGH DAVOS IS PREEMINENT, ITS STATUS
IS PROVISIONAL, ALWAYS DEPENDENT ON THE
EDIFICE OF CACHET THAT SCHWAB HAS BUILT.

B 5 0

WIPED DECEMBER 19 9 9

As one WEF staff member told me,"Klaus is very good at snapping onto
trends and issues of the moment/

The apostles of the high tech boom are Schwab's most recent conquest.
The WEF jumped into the information revolution in a major way in 1997.
The Davos theme that year was "Building the Network Society," and Gates
and Andy Grove were the featured "digital revolutionaries." With that meet¬
ing, Schwab also unveiled a videoconferencing system that let participants
talk to one another over a network.

Since then, Schwab has worked hard to get the big boys and girls of
high tech excited about Davos. By 1998, when the theme was "Priorities for
the 21st Century/the headliners - among them Hillary Clinton, Helmut
Kohl, and Kofi Annan - shared the spotlight with a cluster of A-fist digerati,
including Bloomberg, Bezos, Gates, Larry Ellison, and Sony's Nobuyuki Idei.
In 1999, Davos began posting video archives of panels on the Web at
iive99.weforum.org ,There will be more of the same at the next Davos
meeting, scheduled for January 27 to February 1 .The topics on tap include
the new economy and whether wireless technologies will bolster the
economies of less-developed countries.

Schwab has learned, too, that the meeting is far more interesting if a quo¬
tient of academics, cultural figures, and media people are invited gratis to
fuel content-rich discussions. Most of them enjoy it, but there are occasional
reports of feeling like a show pony. One writer invited to last January's meet¬
ing recalls feeling more "like garnish to the main meaJ/Arlie Hochschild,a
sociology professor at UC Berkeley, lauded Schwab for provoking discussion
of complex global issues, but also said that she felt JJ a little like a bauble/

j r avos has its critics, who tend to focus on the event's bloat, self-

I importance, and potential for losing its uniqueness by becoming too
1watered down* This year, The Sunday Telegraph's Bill Jamieson wrote
that Davos is "the leading event in the global problem-solving calendar,
heavily attended, say cynics, by those who cause them/

"During the Davos weekend, roughly 70 percent of the world's daily
output of self-congratulation is concentrated in one place," noted Peter
Martin of London's Financial Times, "When you look around Davos, you see
the triumph of the middle-aged."

Flip through a directory of distinguished participants from any recent
annual meeting - a brkklike publication, 2 Inches thick and 4 across, that
contains the phone and fax numbers and email addresses of the pantheon
of Davos worthies - and what's immediately evident is that Schwab Is a
consummate dealmaker himself. He's talented at getting big-league busi¬
ness executives to not only show up but pay up - forking over member
dues as well as additional sums to become "partners" that support forum
activities year-round. Both Schwab and the WEF's director, Claude Smadja,
are forthright about the fact that business has always been the keystone of
the forum's arch.

You can certainly see the WEF's evolution and expansion in the reports
issued after each Davos meeting. A decade ago, these publications were
relatively modest affairs, with black-and-white photos showing partici¬
pants on panels and in hot-air balloons. By 1999, the Report on the Annual
Meeting had become a slick color publication documenting a gargantuan
event that involved more than 1,000 CEOs, 300 senior political leaders, 300
intellectuals of varying stripes, 250 members of the press, and 40 heads of
state and government Notables including Al Gore, Russian prime minister
Yevgeny Primakov, Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, Nobel Prize-winning
author Nadine Gordimer,and US treasury secretary Robert Rubin (along

with his deputy and eventual successor, Lawrence Summers) buzzed
among 350 panel discussions on the international monetary system,artifi¬
cial intelligence, spirituality, and corporate merger mania, to name a few.
The informational blizzard was reminiscent of Mann's description of a
Davos snowstorm/monstrous and immeasurable."

In 1992, the WEF inaugurated a series of sub-summits; 10 are held around
the world each year. The WEF also handpicks a group of so-called Global
Leaders for Tomorrow, or GLTs, and hosts mini-summits to which they and
Davos aspirants are invited,These events not only help focus attention on
regional issues but serve as something like farm teams for Davos.

"One of our big frustrations is that everyone wants to go to Davos," says
Pedro Raida, a Spanish expert in international affairs, who coordinates the
WEF's Latin America summits."It's gotten to be such a trademark that
there's often an ego thing between the chair, CEO, and president of a mem¬
ber company over who gets to go. Because we can accommodate only one
from each member company, we created the regional summits/

One gets the distinct sense that as Schwab consorts ever more closely
with the corporate conquerors who animate our age, he chafes against the
confines of his nonprofit foundation* For all his extraordinary access, he
cannot quite run with the Promethean*. While friends say his dream is to
win a Nobel Peace Prize, one also detects a barely suppressed urge to get in
on the real global action like almost everyone else at Davos: courting ven¬
ture capitalists, starting companies and IPOlng, merging, and selling them.

So irrepressible are Schwab's entrepreneurial urges that he has already
helped set up two digital ventures:Think Tools, a knowledge management
software company, and Industry to Industry iwwwJ2Lcom), an online auc¬
tion site selling technology, businesses, even furniture, that he hopes will
ultimately go public, albeit under another nonprofit foundation.

All of it sounds familiar, no? "Yes, Schwab is an idealist/says Harvard's
Kim Clark."But he is also a quintessential entrepreneur ."m m ■

Clockwise from top left:
Scott McNealy; George
Soros; then^German
president Roman Herzog
and Volkswagen's
Ferdinand Piech; Iranian
VP Masoumeh Ebtekar;
Goldman Sachs'

Peter Sutherland and
Egyptian president
Hosni Mubarak.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

05Q

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THE DAVOS MEETING IS A HUGE, SPRAWLING,
CAST-OF-THOUSANDS PRODUCTION.

INSIDE A ONE-MAN SHOW.

Wired: George Soros has described Davos as a "big cocktail party/'
Schwab: I would subscribe to such a description if you say It is serving an
intellectual as well as a social cocktail. For this cocktail, you have to take
different ingredients and create a product that tastes better than the origi¬
nal So In this respect Soros is right.

What is it about an invitation to Davos that makes it so sought after?

When you come to Davos, you know that you will be there with at least
half of the top 10 or 20 players from each country, be it in the economy,
politics, or business. Take as an example the United States: Last meeting
we had the vice president, three cabinet members, two top secretaries of
state, the heads of the top institutions relevant to business - like the SEC
and the FCC - and so on. And you know as well that you will have 20 to 25
leaders from the top companies.

Equally important is that you know you will not be manipufatedrWe will
not suddenly come out with a big Davos declaration on behalf of partici¬
pants that someone cannot subscribe to. And I should add - and now I'm
immodest - that you know you will be attending what is probably the
best-organized meeting in the world.

If that's why people come, what should they leave with?

The benchmark of success is if you can say you have answered three ques¬
tions; One,"Did I take home an idea that will have considerable impact on
the future of my country?"Two,"Did I make a contact who will have consid¬
erable impact on the future of my country?” And three,''Did I learn any¬
thing that will have considerable impact on my own leadership abilities?"
Does Davos have competitors?

There are other communities of interest but nothing on the scale of Davos,
The truth is, our real competition is the lack of time; Everything that com¬
petes for the time and attention of top players is our competitor. In the
end, we are not so much in the conference business as in the attention-
getting business.

There appear to be some intriguing points of tension in what you are
doing. On the one hand, there's idealism - namely, the notion that one
should do good deeds and help the world. But on the other hand,
there is a real fascination with the very practical, dynamic side of
simply doing business.

I have a business education. In addition, I take a very systematic approach
to things. But I have always also had an orientation toward the future, an
interest in the creation of something new. So maybe there is a dualism*
People ask me what I am - what my role is at Davos* When you do such an
event, you must act like an artist, but also like a regisseur (stage manager).

You choose your actors. You choose your script. You get your audience.

And you must choose your vision.

Yes. It's a highly creative act. If you do something, you have to do it with
passion. But I'm aware also that you have to achieve an objective. And you
have to be cost conscious and make sure you always have the necessary
financial resources,The alternative would be to be subsidized, but then
you'd lose your independence. And one of the good things about the
World Economic Forum is that it has always been able to generate enough
financial resources to resist losing Its independence. I would even go as far
as to say that in the whole of our history we have never had to make a
compromise. In terms of independence versus financial attractivity, we
have always chosen independence.

What's the forum's mission in 2000 and beyond?

We are living in a world characterized by a number of factors. Let me
use a few key words; Global Complex.Technology-driven, interdependent.
Time-constrained. It's very dear that in such a world, there are more and
more challenges, and that those challenges need faster and faster
reactions.

And yet at the same time, the power wielded by individual govern¬
ments in this new arena has receded.

Yes, so the challenges cannot be met by governments alone. Most of the
challenges require a close cooperation between governments, business,
academia, and the media.

Are there other players?

Many of today's challenges are created by technology. So you need to
Integrate technology into this interface* I also feel deeply that there must
be a new role for nongovernmental organizations as advocates of civil
society. In fact, we are building a new constituency group of NGOs. And we
look particularly favorably on NGOs that may have different opinions.

How do you organize such a synergy?

My vision for the forum turns on global-policy networks. It's a notion that
was coined about two years ago, is now frequently used by World Bank
president Jim Wolfensohn,and is also very much part of the thinking of
the UN.The Idea is that the best way to deal with key issues, particularly
those still on the horizon - like bioengineering and genetically modified
food, the impact of the Internet on government, the role of Internet-
based learning in education, and privacy and the Internet - is to put the
most knowledgeable and the most influential people together*Then ask:
What are the possible negative outcomes of an issue? What are the
positive aspects? What are the options for action? And what is it possible

0SQ

WIRED DECEMBER 19 9 9

for the international community to do?

So what part exactly does the WEF play in all this?

We see ourselves as an incubator and a hub for these global-policy net¬
works. We are not necessarily the only originators, because a network may
be originated by, for instance, the UN or the World Bank. But we use our
relationships with the world of government, industry, the media, and acad¬
emia to make these networks happen.

Is there any analogy in history for these global-policy networks?
Actually, there are very few models. We are really entering new territory.

As I understand it, the total annual revenues of forum members
comes to about $6 trillion*

That was the last time we made the calculation, about a year and a half
ago. We have added some very big players, so it's higher now.

Could it be that the balance is out of kilter, with business playing too
big a role - a role that in the current mercantile boom threatens to
overwhelm government, politics,academia, even the media?

This is one of life's realities. It's not a moral issue. It's just an economic fact.
Let's take the media: To a large extent, 10 media groups control the capital
base of the world media. This tells us they should be integrated into the
Davos process - not to use their power, but to give them a chance to show
their responsibility. And in business, when you look at people like John
Browne, group chief executive of British Petroleum, or forum council-
member Bertrand Collomb, CEO of Lafarge in France, or people like John
Bryan of Sara Lee in the States - they are aware today that they are politi¬
cians as well as businesspeople. And they really must look for ways to
counterbalance their new political responsibilities with the fact that they
have to remain competitive.

Can you give a practical example?

Mary Robinson - the UN high commissioner for human rights - and I
talked recently about issues of corporate governance in a global world.

We reflected that 10 years ago, the big challenge was to integrate the
notion of environmental responsibility into corporate governance.Today,
although there are still environmental sinners, there is a basic awareness
of responsibility. Now, the same thing has to happen in the field of human
rights - people have to learn to integrate the notion of human rights into
corporate governance. And I would argue that if you asked 100 of our
business members today,"Is this necessary?" probably 70 would say yes.

So the WEF's role is to put these longtime issues on the table, along
with new ones that are just now unfolding*

Yes, and to try to deal with all these issues without immediately emotional¬
izing them. Of course, if you want to make progress, you first have to identi¬
fy the most open - I want to avoid the word progressive - business leaders.

You can't put too many hot issues on the corporate table at once,
can you?

But you have to have a certain courage. Normally a business organization
would go into such a discussion having already formed an opinion, which
then often creates a situation where a conservative point of view and a
resistance to change get emphasized.

It seems to me that implicit in the whole Davos concept is the notion
that the wolf can lie down with the lamb - that business, the media,
governments, and NGOs can, at least, find some reasonable common
ground for discussion.

You've described exactly the most bask thing about our philosophy.
Recently, one of our foundation board members said he thought we had to
define our beliefs much better. And we said,"No, we don't need to, because

our belief is very simple: We want to improve the state of the world." How?
First, by accepting that there are different cultures, ethnicities, lifestyles,
but then by understanding that in the end we are living in a global, inter¬
dependent world. So our contribution to improving the state of the world
is to facilitate a dialogue among these constituent parts.

And who exactly should take part in this dialogue?

We should invite all those who have respect for the opinions of others.

So we should not invite Saddam Hussein.

What does the Davos org chart, as it were, look like?

We are both a members'and a constituents' organization. A member or
partner is a company that helps to maintain us financially. A constituent
is a participant in one of the individual groups that we have set up -
the Global Leaders for Tomorrow, for example.Then we also have forum
fellows, a strong network of people from academia, media, the arts, and
the sciences.

But looking at your programs, it's clear that the business component
dwarfs all the others.

In terms of attendance and financial support, yes - if you take the 2,000
people at our annual meeting, businesspeople comprise about 1,000.

How do you answer the criticism that Davos is fundamentally a water¬
ing hole for the corporate elite - the place rich people go to rub
shoulders with other rich people?

We invite participants not because they are rich, but because they are
playing an important role in shaping the new economy. Davos participants
are not jet-setters who go to Sotheby's auctions and just have a lot of
money,They are people who are accomplishing things.

The high tech industry, and particularly leaders of American com¬
panies, seem to be on the rise at Davos. It's been suggested that some
others resent all the attention they get.

Many people still look at the Internet the way they look at computers, as
another kind of machine that can increase productivity.They don't realize
they are confronting a revolution that will force them to rewrite all the rules
of the game. And so the question for us becomes, How do you make sure
that young entrepreneurs get integrated into the group so that large com¬
panies are challenged by the thinking of the people who are creating the
business world of tomorrow?

How do you track developments in high tech?

I have a team that does nothing but monitor high tech companies to see
who is the most innovative in rewriting business models.

How do you select your business members?

We say that they should be among the 1,000 foremost global companies.
We cannot accept more, because over this number we can no longer create
a feeling of community. We look at revenues and capitalization, but we
also tend to give priority to forward-oriented companies. So we accept
Amazon.com, E*Trade, or eBay because they are trendsetters. Those com¬
panies have all been to Davos. But we have relatively few utilities or textile
manufacturers among our members.

What company is your most recent member?

Nike,

It would certainly meet your criteria*

Yes, we looked at the company, but also at the person at the top - though
that can be a double-edged sword. We want to have the company inte¬
grated with the top person, and not the top person integrated with the
company. Otherwise, if the top person should change, the company will
be at risk. aw ►

□ 50

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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broadband wireless

By Charles Platt

WinStar

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Something unprecedented is taking root among the

metal ducts and wooden water towers atop Manhattan's aging sky¬
scrapers* Small white dish antennas - pointing laterally, not skyward

- herald a new era and a new mind-set in telecommunications, in
New York and other urban areas across America, finally there's a fast
track to the broadband connectivity that copper wires, coaxial cable,
and even fiber have failed to deliver.

The man whose high-stakes, long-odds gamble created the dish
antennas looks deceptively status quo. Bill Rouhana wears a conser¬
vative dark-blue business suit that makes him look like a banker -
indeed, he used to be one. With a disarming, laid-back style, he
describes himself as "just a boy from Brooklyn" - and, yes, he has
the accent and manner that makes it easy to imagine him playing
stickball among the brownstones as a kid.

A more revealing sign of his place in the telecom universe can be
found in an adjoining conference room, where a Incite trophy
from America's Network magazine names Rouhana a member
of its Hal! of Fame, up there with Bill McGowan, former chair
and CEO of MCI, and William I Esrey, chair and CEO of Sprint*
Readers of that same magazine voted Rouhana the "most
forward-thinking carrier executive" of 1999, but "prescient"
is more like it. Back in 1993, he was relatively unknown in the
industry, a senior partner of a lesser-known merchant bank
named WinStar Companies that was quietly financing and build¬
ing a number of media and entertainment properties.Then he stum¬
bled across a 12-page business plan that changed his life.

The plan was written by a legendary Washington, DC, lawyer named
Leo George, who took MCI as his first client when he started practic¬
ing independently in 1969. Almost 25 years later, George acquired a
huge block of radio spectrum from the FCC for free because no one
thought it was worth anything.The spectrum was in the uftrahigh-
frequency 38-GHz band, which can carry huge volumes of data but
has so little penetrating power that heavy rain degrades the signal
while a building or even a tree can block it completely.

George believed that new transmitter technology could solve the
bad-weather problem, and he imagined 38-GHz signals linking celt-
phone base stations in line of sight with one another. To Rouhana,
this completely missed the point*"Two lines in the business plan
haunted me the whole night," he recalls."They stated that the 38-GHz
frequency band is the functional equivalent of fiber, and would be
cheaper and easier to install. So - why couldn't I use this to do what
I wanted to do?"

What he wanted - what he'd been thinking about in idle moments

- was to blast open the slow-modern bottleneck constricting business
access to the Net and deliver online multimedia without excessive
cost or compromise. Orthodox wisdom said that fiber or cable would
make this happen, but Rouhana didn't believe it. He saw inherent
limitations in cable, while fiber was simply too expensive to deploy
door-to-door."i saw it was going to take forever," he says, recalling a
project in Dover Township, New Jersey, involving 38,000 households*
"Bell Atlantic claimed it would connect every single home. After two
years, It still hadn't completed more than half the job*"

Fiber was ideal for high-speed, long distance backbones. In fact, in
1993 this infrastructure was being built with the capacity Rouhana
wanted. So why not bridge the gap between the backbone and the
end user with ultra high-frequency beams? The beauty of this scheme
was that It would do an end run around the local phone companies
and FCC regulations. Best of all, so far as Rouhana could tell, no one
else had come up with his idea.

In a state of excitement, Rouhana called George the next day and
offered to buy the frequencies for $4 million in cash, plus $6 million
in WinStar stock* He also insisted that the slightly stunned George
join the new venture*

There were some formalities. Rouhana had to ensure that new
technology really could make the frequencies work in bad weather
A contract had to be drawn up. Weeks passed. When the agreement
was ready for signatures in February 1994, it was almost too late.

"The day we were closing was one of the worst snowstorms ever,"
Rouhana remembers/'Everything in New York was being shut down,
including all the airports. And then the fax machine started humming,
as people started trying to outbid me. Word had gotten out.There
were counterproposals! I was very upset. Leo and 1 had experienced
an instant bond; we'd both been at Georgetown law, and both hap¬
pened to be part Lebanese.Thank God the snow was there - it kept
him in my office long enough to close the deal.”

Rouhana Is that rare creature, a contrarian
outsider who outsmarted the experts and is now outrunning them.
Today his concept, known as LMDS, for local multipoint distribution
service, is a leader in the new category of fixed wireless broadband.
(Though LMDS technically refers to a narrower band of spectrum,
the term is broadly used In the industry to describe bandwidth
above 20 GHz.) WinStar Companies has become WinStar Communi¬
cations Inc., owning spectrum licenses in 60 major US markets.So
far, it has deployed wireless broadband in more than 30 of them.

The package includes much more than just a pipe. Win Star offers
videoconferencing, LAN interconnections, MPEG-2 video, distance
learning,a proprietary email service, Web hosting,online news,and
a commerce site, Office.com, in which CBS has acquired a one-third
equity stake* WinStar also boasts "key broadband relationships" with
Lexis-Nexis, Standard & Poor's, and Dun & Bradstreet. If customers
want to just surf the Net, they can do that, too.

Continual growth seems assured, since the company has estab¬
lished a $2 billion strategic partnership with Lucent Technologies.
"With Lucent we are working to make sure our network gets built out
as rapidly as possible," says Rouhana."On one level we are a customer
and they are a supplier. On another level they are a financier and
we are a borrower. On yet another level they are providing services
around the world to accelerate our development.They also want to
use our service, and have guaranteed $100 million in business."

Since signing its first client in December 1996, WinStar has installed
more than 500,000 lines serving 120,000 customers, many of them
small to medium-sized businesses, but also a few big names like
Siemens and Colgate-Palmolive. Ironically, the latter company uses

1M AGES; BRIAN M 0 ft IA R T If

the supposedly unreliable 38-GHz system as security backup for its regu¬
lar plain old telephone service.

Internationally, WinStar already offers service in the Netherlands and in
Tokyo and OsakaJt will launch a service in Argentina, has a preferred alloca¬
tion of radio spectrum in the UK, and is looking for grants in other countries.

WinStar is publicly traded (Nasdaq: WCII), has more than 4,000 employ¬
ees, and reports more than $300 million in annualized core revenues, $500
million cash in the bank, and a market capitalization of between $4 billion
and $5 billion. In fall 1999 the company outgrew its Park Avenue head¬
quarters and moved to a larger space a few blocks away, in addition to
leasing 600,000 square feet in suburban Virginia outside Washington, DC.

For WinStar customers, a typical installation works like this: inside a multi¬
tenant building, a conventional Ethernet cable links participating businesses
with a single dish antenna on the roof. When a user sends data, its packets
stream to the antenna, which squirts them out in a tight beam aimed at
another building not far away.This second building is a hub that receives
data simultaneously from many clients, sequences their packets, and pushes
them out on a fiber backbone leased from a long distance company.

Conversely, data from the backbone Is received at the hub, which sorts

"38 GHz is the functional equivalent of
fiber, but cheaper and easier to install."

the packets and distributes them as transmissions aimed at the rooftop
antennas on surrounding buildings. Since audio signals can be digitized
and sent as data packets, LMDS carries telephone service simultaneously -
which is no stretch, since the total bandwidth for each building WinStar
serves can be an amazing 4 billion bits per second, supporting up to
3,360 phone lines per channel, while users enjoy data speeds as high as
250 Mbps (about 4,500 times the speed of a 56K modem).

During the six years it took Rouhana to develop and deploy his service,
alternative technologies have made slow progress. As he predicted, fiber
never became an option for most end users. Annual growth in domestic
fibered buildings fell from 65 percent in 1996 to 47 percent In 1997 to a
miserable 9 percent in 1998,according to Piper Jaffray Equity Research.

Out of 750,000 commercial buildings in America, only 10,000 are served by
fiber. Virtually no residences are connected, and most probably never will be.

DSL is being heavily promoted, with a theoretical maximum download
speed of 7 Mbps, although many consumers opt for cheaper variants such as
Pacific Bell's 384-Kbps service. But DSL squeezes its capacity out of ancient
copper connections and Is usually asymmetric, meaning that you send data
more slowly than you can receive it In chat rooms and newsgroups, many
early adopters complain about outages and transfer rates far slower than
advertised - as low as 120 Kbps for downloads in some cases. If you live more
than 3 miles from your nearest telephone exchange, you can't get DSL at all.

Nearly 1 million people now have cable modems, but many seem unable
to attain the theoretical maximum download speed of 40 Mbps. A recent
Computer Shopper test run got only 600 Kbps - a mere 1,5 percent of the
maximum. Urban cable users may suffer from RF interference that leads to
dropped packets, while overall performance tends to degrade as more of
your neighbors start sharing the cable node,

LMDS claims to be immune to all these problems."Qur system is 99.999

~k.

WinStar founder William
Rouhana, a contrarian outsider
who outsmarted the experts
and is now outrunning them.

percent reliable/ 1 Rouhana says of his fixed wireless
product."The FA A uses us in its air-traffic control net¬
work.This is rock solid, as good as anything you have
seen from any other network provider."

The word w/Ve/ess has created much buzz, but LMDS
is unlike many other unwired systems,The antennas are
highly directional, bolted into place; they do not support
roaming. Nor does LMDS use satellites (such as the forthcom¬
ing Globa I star), Proteus, an airborne communications platform
(see"Ethernet at 60,000 Feet," Wired 7.06, page ISO),will be able

Fixed wireless is now the fastest bridge
across the legendary "last mile."

to use the same radio spectrum as WinStar, but it's not deployed yet
Confusingly, in addition to LMDS there is MMDS (multichannel
multipoint distribution service), which disperses its lower-bandwidth
signal in a broadcast pattern instead of allocating a tight beam to
each end user. Currently, MMDS [which, increasing the confusion, Is
often referred to as "wireless cable") is being tested for relatively high¬
speed consumer-oriented Net access, which may explain why MCI
WorldCom has been buying into companies - including Sprint - that
own the 2- to 3-GHz frequencies allocated for this kind of transmis¬
sion. But because it's a system where all users share the same signal,
it could suffer a performance penalty similar to cable modems when
too many people compete for the limited bandwidth.

Despite the line-of-stght limitation of LMDS, and its relatively short
range, it's now the fastest bridge across the legendary "last mile"
between installed fiber and the end user. Consequently, Rouhana's
once-mocked technology finds itself locked in fierce competition.

Craig McCaw’s Nextlink started out as an early com¬
petitive local-exchange carrier (CLEC) offering independent local
phone service. Nextlink used its own fiber in some urban areas when
it went online in 1996, but now it's going beyond wires Jn a joint
venture with Nextel Communications, it placed winning bids for
LMDS radio spectrum in a 1998 FCC auction. In January 1999, it paid
$695 million for WNP Communications, gaining rights to spectrum
WNP owned. Add it up and Nextlink seems to have become the
largest owner of LMDS spectrum licenses in the United States. In
September 1999, the company launched Its first fixed-wireless
broadband service for testing in Los Angeles.

Meanwhile, earlier in 1999 John Malone, chair of the Liberty Media
Group (now owned by AT&T), announced plans to buy the Associated
Group Inc., which just happened to be the largest shareholder in Teli-

Malone 40 percent ownership of Teligent and opened a new path
for AT&T into local phone service. In 1998 (its first year of operation),
Teligent's LMDS service had penetrated 15 markets across America.
The company aims to have 6,000 building licenses by the end of
1999, providing service in roughly half of them. As of June, it served
28 of the nation's largest metropolitan areas including New York, Los
Angeles, Chicago, Boston, and Philadelphia.

Like Nextlink,Teligent is staffed by telecom veterans.The chair
and CEO is Alex J. Mandl, former president and COO of AT&T. Mandl's
annual salary is estimated to be around $500,000, and he got $20
million worth of incentives when he signed The company was well
able to afford these perks, having raised an initial $1.7 billion - 10
percent of which came from Japanese telecommunications giant NTT,

Kirby G."Buddy" Pickle is Teligent's president and chief operating
officer. After holding various management positions at AT&T, Sprint,
and MCI, he was appointed president and CEO of UUNet when it was
bought by MFS Communications. But, he says, "I became frustrated
with the inability of phone companies to provide my customers with
high-speed access." Al! it took was one chat before he joined MandL

Though Teligent, says Pickle, is committed to being "service oriented,
not content oriented,"the company has announced that it will pro¬
vide ISP facilities some time next year,Teligent's pricing is simple:
The company averages your local phone and Internet charges for the
past couple of months, deducts 30 percent, and bills you the remainder
at a flat rate. But WinStar offers an even more seductive deal: $1,000
worth of free local calls for the first year of a three-year contract*

Net access via Teligent is available at 384 Kbps (to compete with
cheap versions of DSL), or at 1.5 Mbps (equivalent to a T1) or higher,
depending on the pricing plan you choose. So far it's strictly for
businesses, but that may change/'l think within a year you will see
Teligent going to the consumer," says Pickle. Apartment buildings, not
individual homes, will be the target, to spread the cost of the antenna
and its transmitter-receiver across as many customers as possible.

The smallest, newest entrant in fixed wireless is Advanced Radio
Telecom, based in Bellevue, Washington, ART offers data services only;
voice will come later. ART chief exec Henry Hirsch was vice chair and
CEO of Williams Communications Group, which built a nationwide
fiber-optic network that it sold to WorldCom for $2.5 billion in 1995.
In early 1997 Hirsch quit his business involvements for a life of lei¬
sure - but couldn't resist the prospect of running ART as an escape
from what he refers to as "my failed retirement."

When he took over the company later that year, it was trying to
sell wireless links wholesale to CLECs. This raw-bandwidth strategy
was not working, according to Hirsch/1 cut the company in half,"
he says, "then grew it back again as an ISP, serving the end user. We
halved the burn rate and started offering service in three cities."

During 1998, ART focused on raising capital. On June 1,1999, the
company announced a $251 million equity investment from a consor¬
tium including Qwest ($90 million) and Oak Investment Partners ($40
million). Meanwhile, ART was creating its own unique local-network

I MAG £ 5. BRIAN MOAEARTY

topology. While other fixed-wireless companies use hubs that connect with
clients via radio links like the spokes of a wheel, ART is applying technology
from Triton Network Systems to connect buildings in San Jose in a ring using
100BaseT Ethernet.This consecutive*point architecture is meant to be more
fault tolerant, like the Internet itself - although this remains to be proven.

“This company has been very much in experimental mode,"Hirsch says.
“Equipment was purchased by the previous management, and we used it
in three cities. But now with new capital, things are going to change a lot."

Despite his prescience and his leading position in the
field he created, Bill Rouhana still sometimes finds htmself treated con¬
descendingly by competitors .The digs often target WinStar's media hold¬
ings, which include sports-radio talk shows, wellness videos, and "art"
films but make up only a minor portion of overall revenues."He's a banker
from the entertainment industry," comments one spokesperson from a
rival company, who asks not to be named. "What does he know about
telecommunications?"

"Well, Bernie Ebbers was a gym teacher at my high school," Rouhana
responds, deadpan."Jt's true - he really was."

More seriously, he goes on:"Sometimes I feel like Seward, who bought
Alaska. People scorned him, just as they scorned me when I bought those
spectrum licenses. People said,'Doesn't he know it won't work in the rain? 1
Well, of course I had checked, and it works fine."

"What it comes down to is simply engineering for rain-fade," says Inter¬
national Data Corporation analyst Jeannette Noyes. Rough translation:

If you have more weather, you need more ceils. "The big issue is the per¬
ception that wireless is not as reliable as wireline."

"Wireless is the best way to extend the network," responds Rouhana,
with Alaska-size insistence,"and the rest of the world has finally figured
out what we knew,"

Some Silicon Valley honchos seem to agree. During the UCLA-sponsored
30th anniversary celebration of the Internet in September 1999, panelist
Christine Hemrick of Cisco was asked which technology - DSL or cable -
would be the key to bringing broadband into the home. Her reply; Wireless
will be competitive with both - soon. Earlier in the year, at the Vortex99
conference, attended by CEOs and CTOs from many major telecom players,
an audience poll placed wireless behind DSL - but ahead of cable - as the
choice that "holds the most promise."

Ultimately, Rouhana believes his spectrum can reach more than 200
million people in the US. This raises tantalizing possibilities. LMDS would
be the ultimate video-on-demand distribution medium. With a large
enough customer base, WinStar could package its own content, rivaling
HBQ or CNN. Does Bill Rouhana see himself as a 21st-century Ted Turner?

He laughs at the thought "Who knows?" he says."My original vision, which
is still my vision, was to integrate computer technology and information in a
broadband network. Does it include video? Absolutely. Movies? Not in this
round, but as we get further along and can offer services beyond the busi¬
ness market, we'll offer whatever the right services are."

Rouhana doubts WinStar will go after the residential market for several
years, but hints cautiously,"! can imagine a way to get there earlier: Let's say

a cable company wanted to expand its addressable market. Welt, in the
future we will have line-of-sight to thousands of multiple dwelling units -
almost 10 percent of the country's residences.That would be very attrac¬
tive to a cable company. 1 can imagine partnering with one that already
has its own arrangements for consumer billing, customer service, and so
on, so that we wouldn't have to do it all by ourselves."

In the meantime, though, one seemingly trivial problem interferes with
all of WinStar's plans."Our biggest impediment is access to buildings," says
Rouhana."Eighty-five percent of US businesses are in multitenanted build¬
ings. And it takes me 9 to 24 months to get access to one building."

So, having built a multibniion-dollar business in competition with some of
the nation's biggest telecom corporations, a visionary entrepreneur suddenly
finds himself obstructed by that most elemental life-form: the landlord.

The annoyance is compounded when you realize that other services are
insulated from this problem by state and federal laws."Utility companies,
including phone companies, have legal right of access,"Rouhana points
out.Table companies have widespread access.They can get in the build¬
ing first and negotiate terms later."

Landlords hardly ever say no to an antenna on the roof; they just take
many months to get used to the idea and to draw up the necessary docu¬
ments. And Rouhana needs to talk to 150,000 of them."This is going to
delay broadband for another five years?" Rouhana complains, shaking his
head in disbelief."It does not compute!" WinStar predicts it will have access
to more than 8,000 buildings by the end of the year, but as Rouhana puts
it,"1 don't want to have to wait years to get to the rest of the landlords
out there."

In the meantime, Rouhana plans to lobby for legislation to put him on an
equal basis with phone companies, forcing landlords to open their doors -
and their rooftops. Tm the ultimate capitalist,"he says."! believe in private
property. I want to work with landlords so they get appropriate protec¬
tions. AH I want is access to the roof and internal wiring to connect with it"

So ft seems fixed-wireless broadband won't entirely avoid the regulatory
quagmire. On the other hand, wireless
data is increasingly beaming into
our daily lives, squeezed into
countless on-the-go note¬
books, PDAs, and cell
phones. More likely than
not, it won't be long
before renters demand
broadband be part of
the package with other
workaday necessities
like electricity and tele¬
phones. Then Rouhana
may find the tables turned,
as his antennas achieve
another unprecedented break¬
through: taking up residence in
midtown Manhattan - rent-free.

WIRED

v ■

'/ This August, Wired asked you to

/ vote on "the best in tech" in

-/ Wired's first ever Readers'

READERS’ RAVES Choice Poll - the 1999 Readers'

Raves. Wired readers have an
t/) enlightened sense of what's next and what’s
UJ best, and it is fitting that these awards are the
^ result of polling an informed and passionate
q; community.

<g The nominees and winners were celebrated
October 14, 1999 at the Readers* Raves
q Awards Gala in San Francisco. Comedian Al
< Fran ken hosted and pop iconoclast band,
UJ They Might Be Giants performed at the gala
awards ceremony.

^ Here are the results - your votes for the people,
products and websites igniting the world
> around us.

PRODUCT RAVES

TOR RAVE

Bill Gates

Wired Visionary
Architect of the Future,

So why is Bill king of the mountain? Brains, agility, tenacity and
singular leadership, Bill's prescience-ifs the software, stuprdl-has
resulted in Microsoft desktop dominance across the globe. And
when a new market opportunity emerges-the Internet, let's say-BHI
is right there with the goods. In 1975, people thought his and Paul
Allen's shared idea of PCs on every desk and in every home was
crazy. "Qur vision at Microsoft is expanding to take in the whole
world of connected devices and this new way of computing," Bill
says now, "We're still in the infant stages of what computers can
do, how we can make them much simpler and use them to improve
everyone's lives*" In accepting his award, Bill acknowledged his
selection as Wired Visionary with trademark humility. "Being
named an architect of the future is pretty intimidating, especially
considering how long it took to finish the construction of my house."

Runner up: Steve Jobs (Apple Computer)

Nominees: C. Michael Armstrong (AT&T)

Fred Smith (FDX Corporation)

Jeff Bezos (Amazon.com)

John Chambers (Cisco Systems)

Jorma Ollila (Nokia)

Joseph Nacchio (Qwest Communications)

Linus Torvalds (Linux)

Pierre Omidyar (eBay)

Richard Li (Pacific Convergence Corporation)

Scott McNealy (Sun Microsystems)

Intel Pentium III Xeon Processor

Best Business Product

The must-have for the connected executive.

pentlum*T

Nintendo Game Boy Color

Best Entertainment Product
Your Fun Fetish.

Intel isn't surprised Wired readers chose a processor as Best
Business Product. They know you recognize processing power
as a key factor for success in the new economy. "The fast and
unpredictable growth of the Internet economy and the continuing
demand for a scalable and reliable ebusiness environment are
causing an explosion of digital data that demands processing
power," says Mike Fister, VP and General Manager of Intel's
Enterprise Server Group. “Creating, managing, and sharing this
data is extremely important to ebusinesses today." Intel Inside is
a mantra Wired readers have taken to heart.

Runner up: Apple Power Macintosh G3 Computer

Nominees: Casio Cassiopeia E100 Organizer

Ericsson I BBS World Mobile Phone
Motorola StarTAC clipOn Organizer
Research In Motion BlackBerry Wireless Email Solution
Silicon Graphics 540 Visual Workstation
3Com PalmV Connected Organizer

It's been a decade since the debut of Game Boy-the first portable,
handheld game system with multiple titles. With the introduction
of Game Boy Color last year, more than 3.7 million fans now enjoy Super
Mario Bros „ Turok, Chessmaster, Joust , Tetris and the unbelievably
popular Pokemon games (as well as nearly 500 others) screaming
in vivid 56-color display. "Game Boy Color's audience is very
diverse: all ages and nearly 40 percent are female," says Perrin
Kaplan, Director of Corporate Affairs for Nintendo. Vic, A Wired
reader from Fairfax, Virginia, weighs in. Game Boy Color is "easy
and convenient to stash somewhere on those long trips. It also has
a huge library of games, so that almost every type of gamer will be
satisfied." And with its new color casings, it's an indispensable
addition to every backpack and briefcase.

Runner up: Panasonic PalmTheater Portable DVD Player

Nominees; Diamond Multimedia Rio PMP300
Fujifilm MX-27QQ Digital Camera
Nullsoft Winamp

Replay Networks ReplayTV Personal Television
Sony DCR-TRV510 DigitalS Handycam Camcorder
Sony Video Photo Frame
71 Vo Personal Television System

Windows* Compatible

Without a doubt, Macs are the best personal computers on the market today. And now,
with the G4s, the Macs are also the best personal supercomputers. What’s the one thing these
supercomputers still need? Compatibility and interoperability with the Windows world!
Connectix Virtual PC is a software solution that brings Windows capabilities right to
your Mac -- run Windows programs, access PC networks, share files between your
Mac PC desktops and more. All on one computer, your Mac!

Virtual PC is available in 3 versions: with PC-DOS, Windows 95 or 98. It’s also
compatible with Windows NT and Linux. Get two computers in one and gel it today!

To buy or for more information, go to www.connectix.com or call 1-800-395-1804.

www.connectix.com 1.800.395.1804

vi Connectix

WIRED READERS' RAVES

Apple /Mac

Coolest Product Design
Inspires your technofust.

Amazon.com

Best Ecommerce Website
Your favorite etailer.

amazon.com

Jerry, a Wired reader in New York, voted for the iMac for its "brilliant
colors and ‘curvular 1 shape." We couldn't have said it better... The
deliciously designed ilVfac became an instant pop icon and fashion
statement the minute it hit the market. But Jonathan lve f Vice
President Industrial Design at Apple Computer, discusses his work
in a larger context "The preoccupation with product attributes that
are easy to understand and measure is witness to the creative
bankruptcy of countless industries. We are trying to design simple
products that are accessible and engaging. We are genuinely trying
to define some meaningful alternatives." Now Apple is tempting us
with a sexy little laptop version of the iMac. Who wouldn't drool?

Runner up: Philips 42" FiatTV

Nominees: Audi TT Coupe

Harley-Davidson XL 120QS Sportster
Nike Rift Laceless Running Shoe
Nokia 8800-Series Mobile Phone
Oakley Time Bomb Watch
Sony AIBO Entertainment Robot
Sony VAIO Z505 SuperSlim Pro Notebook

WEB RAVES

Ironically, the etail empire that is now Amazon.com was built on
warehouses full of an allegedly endangered species: books. With its
reader reviews, handy one-click ordering, and swift delivery,
Amazon succeeds wildly in nurturing trust among its 12 million
loyal customers. "They offer a dazzling array of product in all of
their major lines-books, music, software and video," enthuses
Wired reader Mary Ellen Molski of Kensington, Connecticut. "And
as they add new features (e.g. toys and auctions), I find myself turning
even more frequently to them to meet my shopping needs."

Runner up; e8ay.com

Nominees: Apple.com
Beyond.com
Buyxom
CDNOW.com
Dell.com
Drugstore.com

Expedia.com (Microsoft Expedia Travel)

Gatewayxom

PreviewTrave I .com

Priceline.com

Wine.com

Yahoo. com

Best News and Information Website
Stay connected.

Yahoo!

Yahoo! began as "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle," a
little Internet directory that has grown into our most trusted Web
destination. Wired readers agree that Yahoo! is the portal that
defines portaldom. All the online information and communications
resources you'll ever need, right there on one neat page. "Yahoo!
has been out in the lead in creating new and innovative ways with
which to harness the power of the Internet," says Wired reader
George Wagner of San Diego. "From its original search engine to
the powerful individual capabilities it now offers users, it has been
the pioneer in exploiting the usefulness of the Web,"

Runner up; CNN.com {CNN Interactive}

Nominees: AOL.com

AskJeeves.com

CBSSportsLine.com

CitySearch.com

CNET.com

DrudgeReport.com

Excite.com

GO.com {GO Network)
iVillage.com
MSNBC.com
Oxygen.com

NYTimes.com (The New York Times on the Web)
Quokka.com (Quokka Sports)

Salon.com

TheStreet.com

WSJ.com (The Wall Street Journal
Interactive Edition)

Etrade^com

Best Financial Website
Fast track to early retirement.

E^TRADE*

In the early 1980s, E*TRADE founder Bill Porter wondered, "Why
do individual investors have to pay brokers hundreds of dollars for
stock transactions?" He anticipated a day when investors would
have personal computers and immense personal control over their
portfolios. To this day, E*TRADE # s philosophy is to "put the power
and choice back into the hands of the individual. That means
leveling the playing field for individuals, democratizing the entire
financial services industry." Wired readers are taking to E*TRADE
in droves.

Runner up: Schwab.com (Charles Schwab)

Nominees: ClearStation.com

Datek.com (Datek Online)

DiscoverBrokerage.com

DLJdirect.com (Donaldson, Lufkin, & Jenrette)
Fidelity.com (Fidelity Investments)

NDB.com (National Discount Brokers)

Quick-Reilly.com

WitCapital.com

WRHambrecht.com

Trying to make money is only half the fun.

No...that's pretty much it.

hether you're a trader on the floor or a forest ranger in Wyoming, just about everyone's interested in
making money. E*TRADE* knows why you invest- That's why we give you the tools and research you need to
make better investing decisions. E*TRADE* gives you everything from market insights that come directly off the
street to Smart Alerts that help you keep tabs on your investments. We also work to give you the best investing
experience possible by offering trades as low as $4.95 with rebate, 24-hour customer service and after-hours
trading so you can get a head start on the next trading day. For more information, visit etrade.com, aol keyword:
etrade or call us at 1-800 ETRADET,

Its time for

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WIRED READERS' RAVES

IGN.com

Best Entertainment Website
Your favorite online obsession.

77m Koogte, Yahoo /

New Media Innovator
Challenging the media establishment.

Imagine Media launched its Games Network in 1997, establishing
a world of fun online for the gaming community. CEO Mark Jung
notes IGN f s approach is unique because it "focuses on gamers"
interests outside of games," joining with affiliated Websites to
provide crossover content about movies, TV, science fiction and
pop culture. He says, "Through great content, IGN.com has built a
community of diehard fans and advocates that are loyal to the network,""

Runner up: MP3xom

Nominees: AmmationExpressxom

Broadcast.com
DavidBowie.com (BowieNet)

Eonline.com

Feedmag.com (FEED Magazine)

GameSpot.com

HSX.com {Hollywood Stock Exchange)

LiquidAudio.com

Nerve.com

Pogo.com (formerly ten.net)

Gradioxom

Spinnerxom

TheOnionxom

PEOPLE RAVES

Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com

Ecommerce Innovator
Redefining retail.

Jeff Bezos, founder, chair and CEO of Amazon.com, pioneered the
current ecommerce boom with his vision of the virtual store. The
vision began humbly in 1995, as Bezos tapped out the Amazon
business plan on a laptop while he and his wife drove cross-country.
Bezos, of course, left the driving to his wife. Since then, Bezos has
convinced both consumers and merchants that the Net is a better
place to shop. Lance Meredith, a Wired reader from Pasadena
notes that, "while many have followed suit, Mr. Bezos remains one
of the first to foresee the future of the global marketplace."*

Runner-up: Meg Whitman (eBay)

Nominees: Bill Hambreeht (WR Hambrecht & Co.)

Jay Walker (Pricenne.com)

Mark Cuban (Broadcast.com)

Michael Dell (Dell Computer)

Peter Neupert (Drugstore.com)

Ted Waitt (Gateway)

Yahool chairman and CEO Tim Koogle joined the company in 1995
and oversaw a period of rapid expansion, transforming the popular
internet directory into a standards-setting portal incorporating a
vast network of sites and services. Under his guiding hand,
YahooLs astonishing growth continues. He"s now set company sights
on strategic acquisitions and hosting etatl stores - out for nothing less
than dominating the nexus of online media and commerce.

Runner-up: Rob Glaser (RealNetworks)

Nominees: Candice Carpenter {iVillage.com)

George Bell (Exdte@Home)

Geraldine Laybourne {Oxygen Media)

Halsey Minor (CNET)

Michael Bloomberg (Bloomberg L.P.)

Steve Case (America Online)

Tom Rogers (NBC)

George Lucas

(Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace)

Entertainment Innovator
Blowing our minds.

A creative maverick who can call his own shots on every level,
George Lucas appeared to take his own sweet time in satiating our
lust for all things Star Wars. But while we were waiting, he too was
waiting-for the technology to catch up to his vision. "I wanted to see
creatures like Watto and Jar Jar and races like the Pod Race for real.
I’d wanted to see that for 20 years, but I could never do it." Wired
asked Lucas how aware he is of ‘'innovating" while he is making a
film. f "We were always innovating in Episode /, because the whole
thing was an innovation. The whole idea of taking and making
photo realistic characters and putting them into a photo realistic
film and making that work was a huge challenge," he explained.
"But we are not technology-driven, we are story-driven. I come up
with a story, and then we have to figure out how to do it It's just
that you can't tell a fantastic story in cinema without technology.
Innovation is not the goal. It's the result of telling a story."

Runner-up: Larry and Andy Wachowski (The Matrix)

Nominees: Chuck D (Swindler's Lust)

David Bowie (BowieNet)

David Cronenberg { eXistenZ)

John Carmack (Quake Ilf)

John Lasseter and Andrew Stanton (A Bug's Life)
Quincy Jones (Qradio)

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* Command your knights in menacing formations.

* Dominate the worlds marketplaces.

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Barbarossa, Joan of Arc, and Genghis Khan.

* Listen to monks speak of thirteen unique
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'& 1S99 Mfcaosofi Corporation. AH rights rasa-rvecL Micfcseft, Age o! Bripite^V 1
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IMAGE RIGHT. WILLIAM FAULKN EH

S T R E

GAME

Rest in inner Peace

Fighting games are typically
ham-fisted and brutal. Fatality!
Super Death Combo! Please.

Rather than endless levels
of mindless button-mashing,
subtle, delicate tactics are
the key to Soul Calibur, for
Sega's Dreamcast. It's doser
to controlling a ballet dancer
than a mutant psychotic. GK,

I favor graceful females such
as Xianghua [above] over
nastier thugs like Yardman
- maybe it's evidence of my
virtual cross-gender fantasies
Still, I was completely
seduced by the perfectly
rendered rose petals floating
in the breeze and strands, of
my fighter's hair flowing in
sync with her exertions.

As you move through Soul
Contour's Mission Battle Mode
in quest of the games name¬
sake Soul Edge wonder blade,
each level unfolds in luscious
detail. Some stages force
me to defend myself with
invisible weapons, some have
multiple foes, and, refresh¬
ingly, some require only that
I perfect a certain skill.The
elegance of Soul Cotibur
strikes me as more than a
little Zen-Iike.There's nothing
like kicking ass in the name
of inner peace. - Scoff Tom

Soul Calibur for Dreamcast:
$39.95. Namco: www.rwrm&m.

e t c R e d A

HARDWARE

Rip-and-Roll Highway

Musk has always been missing from my old bone-shaking Beetle - the stereo
chewed its last tape on the vehicle's first day. I couldn't wait to install empeg
car, the jitter-free MP3 stereo from a Cam bridge, Eng land-based startup. It's a
hard-driving, long-lasting alternative to the typical stereo deck.

The 3.5-pound, Linux-based computer is the same size as the average remov¬
able car stereo, though it has the advantage m looks - it's stylishly finished with
a blue, green, or amber screen. The less mechanically minded, however, should
seek professional help to install the docking bay, and the unit doesn't come
with an amplifier or speakers, so you'll have to choose some good ones from
the local car-stereo store.

To fill the empeg car deck with musk, just connect It to your computer via a
USB cable (or standard serial port) and start sucking down tracks. You can get
singles from MP3 Web sites, or rip music off your own CDs with the included
demo version of AudioCataiyst software. Then drag and drop tunes into an
onscreen list of songs bound for your rolling jukebox.

With a capacity of 4 Gbytes - equivalent to 75 hours of music - and expan¬
sions available to 20 gigs, there's enough space on the unit's hard drive for most
lifetime CD collections. And setting yourself up for mammoth road trips is
quick and easy; an hour of CD-quality music took me around three and a half
minutes to download. (By contrast, using the serial port took an hour and 45
minutes.} Slide this MP3 monster back into your dash, and you're ready to roll

Since it's Linux, there's a cute penguin logo on the startup screen, and if
you've updated your tracks via a Net music database, the song titles scroll by
while they're playing. On the road, I found the four buttons on the front panel
clumsy. Left and right arrows double up for track skip and volume control, so
I managed to alternately blast my ears out and zip through the entire playlist
in seconds.The down button opens menu options such as digital radio, graphic
equalizer, and track arrangement; the up button pauses the song. Using the
remote control, with its separate buttons for each function, was easiest - and
extremely practical if you tap empeg car's audio line out to plug it into your
living-room hi-fi* Losing your grip on the remote control behind the wheel is
another matter entirely. Cue Mr. Bean fumbling around the floor while driving
down the freeway. - David Cohen

4-Gbyte empeg car: $1,099. empeg: +44 (1223) 576123, fax +44 (1223) 576124,
info@empeg.com, www.empeg.com.

WIRED DECEMBER 19 99

www.smashstatusquo.com

Business as usual? Not with
Adobe" software for the Web.
Go, See for yourself

Inspiration becomes reality.

Adobe

a o ok

Biodetective

The Silk Code shadows forensic
detective Phil D'Amato as
he investigates a janitor-
reported to be about 30,000
years old - who works in
New York University's Bobst
Library.The flatfoot eventually
ferrets out the truth behind
this Neanderthal-looking
custodian - whose "consuming
interest" is silk - after he shows
up at O' Amato's door holding
a deadly insect,

This first novel by Paul
Levinson, author of the nonfic¬
tion Digital Ntcluhon, may be
as twisted as a double helix,
but it's not as far as you might
think from his earlier The Soft
Edge, about the coevolution
of humanity and technology,
Chapter 2, for example, reaches
back to the mid-3th century
and follows another protago¬
nist who takes to the seas to
disprove a shaman's dictum
thar'Loss is life itself." Like the
journey, some of the turns in
the story are harder to take
than others; a pivotal event
centers on a forged newspaper
article that appears, implau¬
sibly, in The New York Times,
Loose threads aside, this is
not a bad yam, -J.Schuiz

The Sitk Code, by Paul Levinson:
$23,9 S. Tor Books: w ww. tor. com .

HARDWARE

Magic Markers

Using eBeam feels like sleight of hand. You show everyone a normal whiteboard,
but as you start writing on it, every mark you make also appears on a nearby
monitor.The meeting continues. You add notes in different colors, you erase,
others write - and it all shows up onscreen, in color, written by an invisible hand.
To conclude the electric writing demonstration, you tap a spot on the corner of
the board, and a nearby printer produces the notes.

Such practical magk eliminates the chore of whiteboard-copying. But the
eBeam meeting and teleconferencing software lets you do more than just take
notes: You can revisit and play back previous sessions, take snapshots of multiple
screens before you erase, and save entire meetings in various formats. You can
archive your startup's first board meeting for posterity, or retrieve those story¬
board sketches born of the creatives at JWT and too much Sumatra blend. Not
only that, eBeam lets you annotate, highlight, and rearrange onscreen notes
during the meeting or afterward - giving you the chance to revise history in
the most flattering way.

In addition, eBeam allows you to host whiteboard meetings remotely, via the
network. Other PCs running eBeam software can log in to your session, password
protected, and highlight or annotate along with you. Machines without eBeam
can see the session through any Java-enabled browser - but they can only look,
not touch. While rival whiteboard systems, such as Virtual Ink's mimio, must be
coupled with Microsoft NetMeeting for this remote conferencing capability,
eBeam does it ail by itself.

Setting up eBeam is easy: Install the software on your PC, stick two suction-
cupped pods to the face of the whiteboard, then plug in to an electrical outlet and
your serial port.The fun comes when you slip the dry-erase markers into special
sleeves, launch the app, and write. As the marker moves across the whiteboard,
four tiny transmitters at the tip of the battery-powered sleeve send infrared data
to the pods, which determine the marker's position tike a micro version of a GPS
tracker.The pods pick up signals near the board's surface as well as on it; by un¬
hinging the sleeve and pressing a spring-loaded button on the back of the marker,
you can hold it a fraction of an inch above the board and write words onscreen -
a great way to get your ideas off the drawing board. - Pout Spinrad

eBeam: $599.95, Electronics for Imaging;+1 (650) 357 3500, www,efi>com.

HARDWARE

Head Trip

Surround-sound blasts engulf you, bringing you fur¬
ther into the action of the movie, but instead of sitting
in a digitally equipped cinema or some millionaire's
home theater, you've just got a pair of measly head¬
phones strapped to your noggin.The secret? New
audio technology from Dolby Labs called Dolby
Headphone, which psychoacoustically creates the
sound of a well-tuned home-theater setup on any old
pair of ear goggles. This groundbreaking system is
due out in other devices next year, but for now the
only way to experience it is during in-flight movies on
Singapore Airlines - not just in first class, but
throughout the plane.

To find out whether this was just another phan¬
tom audio format or the real thing, I headed over to
Newark Airport and climbed aboard Singapore Air
Flight SQ23, bound for Amsterdam, I reclined my
seat, opened a bag of peanuts, and began watching
The Mummy r , Without question, the dead sure came
alive; the sound was expansive and crisp and had
much more depth than the non-Dolby soundtrack
for in-flight television. Its like the difference between
TV speakers and a surround-sound listening room,
(Audiophile alert: This latest sound processing tech¬
nology from Dolby should not be confused with the
impressive but less versatile Sony Dolby Digital Sur¬
round - see "The 11 Factor," in Wired Tools.)

The 3-D effect was amazing, though it seemed the
movie dialog came from inside my head.The other
surround-sound effects were pronounced - maybe
excessive. Dolby Headphone has more depth than
many listeners are used to, and loud explosions will
make you jump; the woman next to me had to keep
adjusting the volume. Stal'd never heard anything
like it - truly supersonic audio. - Gregor Bohowick

Dolby Headphone: standard in alt seats. Singapore Airlines:
(800) 742 3333, www.singaporeaircom.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

Q7H

SAVINGS.

IP network solutions make new worlds of communication possible Integrating your data and voice networks can
save you money. Achieving this convergence transparently, without compromising your present investment or next
investment in PBXs and phone sets, is another matter That’s where NEC's 100 years ot experience in reliable com¬
munications really shows, NEC's innovative solutions can make fuJI-featured telephony over data networks as simple
as changing a few cables and adding cards to your existing NEC equipment. So
you can enjoy new Voice Over the Internet Protocol (VOIP) technology without the
pain of obsolescence. A world leader in communications, computers and semicon¬
ductors, NEC solutions are At The Center Of Innovation, www.nec.com

WEB

Helping Hand

Hang in there-help is on the
Web. MyHel pd esLcom/the
Yahoo! of tech support/ is a
portal for finding assistance
with hardware and software.
Type in equipment model
numbers and upgrade ver¬
sions, and it provides corre¬
sponding links to vendor sup¬
port, training info, online
forums., plug-ins, and other
technical resources - every¬
thing from Microsoft's support
pages to geek chat rooms.

For my HP LaserJet printer,
for example, t was given links
to HP's troubleshooting line,
its Y2K-pre pa red ness page,
and the surprisingly philo¬
sophical Yahoo! Printers Club.
And because MyHelpdesk.com
hosts a specialized search
engine, I could scour the Net
on highly specific topics - say,
Microsoft Excel barcharts.

There are kinks, of course:
Some categories - ISPs, vari¬
ous hardware - are not yet
available. Still, the site pro¬
vides a great deal of easy-to-
find information and saves
you from slogging through
corporate sites for the right
SOO number. - Sally McGrow

MyHelpdesk.com:

www.myhelpdesk.com.

HARDWARE

Electric Avenue

Test-driving the Toyota Prius hybrid electrk/gasolme-powered car on the streets
of Beverly Hills, I experienced the same giddy sensation I got using a Macintosh
for the first time: Holy God! This thing is going to change the world! And not just
by turning heads.

You wouldn't suspect it of this cute little thing. The Prius looks like the offspring
of a new Volkswagen Beetle and a Lexus GS - curvy and cuddly, but mean-looking
with scowling headlights. Flip open the hood, though, and the epiphany begins.

Toyota's clever engineers have packed both an electric motor and a small
combustion engine into the sedan. An array of five computers and dozens of
sensors regulate the power sources for maximum efficiency. At low speeds, the
car runs just on electricity, eerily silent. At highway speeds, or during acceleration,
the 1.5-liter, four-cylinder gas engine kicks in almost undetectably for an addi¬
tional boost - 101 horsepower at maximum combined output.The gas engine
and the brakes recharge the battery, so you never have to plug the Prius into an
electrical outlet. Best of all, the car I drove for three days on the brutal streets of
Southern California got 55 miles per gallon.

Considering that, as a class, electric cars are kind of granola, I was delighted by
the Prius'performance. It handled about as well as my Honda Civic EX, hugging
freeway doverleafs and executing snappy turns. The acceleration was admirable. I
could leave most drivers in the dust when the light turned green, but then I did
have an unfair advantage - the Prius causes involuntary gawking.

Put aside the car-geek stuff and you still have a sexy car. I was paid the highest
compliment when the valet at a wedding I attended parked my ride among the
BMWs and Porsches.The attendant was dismayed to hear that he would have to
wait until next summer to buy one in the US (the Prius has been on sale in Japan
since December 1997).

Why didn't they make a car like this sooner? - Kourosh Karimkhany
Prius: about $19,500 in Japan (available in US summer 2000J. Toyota: www.royom.com.

R E A D M A

0N THE BOOKSHELVES Of THE DI-GIRATf

NANA NAISfilTT

futurist and author, High Tech - High Touch.

Medusa and the Snail , by Lewis Thomas. This book was
written in 79, when premed was becoming more popular.
Thomas, himself a doctor, thought medical students should
be required to have the broadest-based education, and that
this idea should be extended to all professions: Undergrad
education Is necessary for understanding what it is to be
human. My alma mater, the University of Chicago, recently
announced it was reducing Its core curriculum. When I was
a student, you had two years of literature and humanities.
Now the students can take more electives in their special¬
ties, and I just bemoan that, i think we need more cross-
disciplinary studies."

WILLY HENSHALL

founder and chair ,; Rocket Network.

Epson Stylus Photo 700 printer manual 1 ' Every so often
there's a bit of equipment that represents a paradigm shift
in how we do things,This printer allows me to get pictures
from a camera without getting photos developed anymore.
To get it to work, I had to read the manual beginning to end
My background is in audio, so l r m used to reading manuals
for studio equipment. Before my mom passed away earlier
this year, I went to the UK to see her and took the printer, the
computer, and my camera. We talked about stuff while we
were sitting in the hospital, and then I’d go back to my hotel
and print out the pictures, I showed her my house and did a
little photo spread with all of her grandchildren. We had pic¬
tures across the bed, and it made a big difference to her."

-Me Sullivan

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

IMAGES: TOP RrGHT; ERIC LIMQN BOTTOM RIGHT: ROBERT GOLDSTEIN

Even cold rolled steel can
have a heart and soul.

Presenting a car literally bred for performance: the Chrysler 300M. A truly modern sports sedan descended
directly from the original muscle car, the 1955 Chrysler C-300. While a 253 horsepower multi-valve
engine lies under its aggressively sculpted hood, 45 years' worth of passion for pushing the envelope
constitute its soul. $29,690,* fully equipped. Call 1.800.CHRYSLER or visit www.chrysler.com for more info.

CHRYSLER 300M

*Base MSRP includes destination. Tax. options & wheels shown, extra.

MUSIC

ERIC DDLPHY
Illinois Concert (Blue Note)

An oft-forgotten contemporary
of Coltraneand Mingus,

Eric Dotphy walked the line
between traditional and avant-
garde jazz. This disc captures
his touring quartet, which in¬
cluded pianist Herbie Hancock,
and presents a spellbinding
rendition of'God Bless the
Child," A master of the clarinet
flute, and saxophone, Dolphy
died young, but not before
leaving his mark. - Mitch Myers

SHELBY LYNNE

/ Am Shelby Lynne (Mercury)

After a decade as a singer-songwriter on the
Nashville circuit, Alabama-bred Lynne has
jumped out of the small pond Joining forces
with producer Bill Bottrell (who works with
Sheryl Crow), Lynne performs musical alchemy
on this pop-soul-country gem, conjuring Dusty
Springfield, Lisa Stansfield, and early Bonnie
Raitt. From the swelling strings of “Your Lies" to
the '60s R&B ofTeavin'"and the drowsy, back-
porch rhythms of "Where I'm From/ she delivers
10 tunes about heartache and belonging,
gorgeously wrapped in sultry melodies. And the
slide-guitar-bluesy "Life Is Bad" resonates with
her past .This CD is both a declaration of self
and a crossover classic - Beth Johnson

HANDSOME BOY
MODELING SCHOOL
So... How's Your Girl?

(Tommy Boy)

Prince Paul, the producer of
Chris Rock s comedy albums,
and partner Dan "The Automa-
tor" Nakamura team up on this
lighthearted project, Sillrness
aside, what endures is the
duo's sense of adventure as
they create beats for hip hop
luminaries (Brand Nubian, Del
Tha Funkee Homosapien) as
well as some unlikely folks
(Sean Lennon, Father Guido
Sarducci).- Tamara Palmer

EVERYTHING BUT THE GIRL
Temperamental (Atlantic)

Sometimes you just need to wallow; Everything
but the Girl understands this, and while Ben
Watt and Tracey Thorn's music has become
progressively more electronic over the last
decade, Its eerie gloom remains intact. On the
duo's first full-length release since 1996, Watt
calls on the dark DJ sounds of London's under¬
ground haunts. Somber ballads like "Low Tide
of the Night" weave Watt s break beats with
Thom's sultry voice. EBTG has always dealt in
the agony of broken relationships and lonely
lives, and its latest release is no exception. As
Thorn laments in "No Difference,""If you're all
alone, well, whose fault can that be?" It's mine,
dammit, so let me brood. - Euan Ratliff

FifcClESlCAVON V*OC
YQEllfcVI

AftANM STfWf'K&NV OUCHEMSA

DON BYRON

Romance With the Unseen

(Blue Note)

After wowing fans and critics
with dazzling excursions into
klezmer, swing, funk, rap, and
Afro-Carl bbean mu sic, jazz
clarinetist Don Byron slips into
a subtle, pastoral mode for this
outing. With the help of guitar
ace Bill Frisell and drummer
Jack DeJohnette, Byron explores
the work of Lennon-McCartney
(Til Follow the Sun"), Herbie
Hancock ("One Finger Snap"),
and Duke Ellington ("Mural
From Two Perspectives") with
elegant melancholy. poet

songs of a wayfarer

FREDERICA VON STADE/

ATLANTA SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
Gustav Mahler: Symphony no. 4 ,

Songs of a Wayfarer (Telarc)

Known as the last of the great German Roman¬
tics, Mahler did his title proud Not only are his
compositions exempiary of this adventurous
genre, but the man himself was obviously smit¬
ten. Songs ofo Wayfarer - sung expressively by
diva von Stade - is set to Mahler's own German
lyrics, absolutely maudlin with the stains of love.
For Symphony no. 4, he Felies more on his prow¬
ess as a master of symphonic beauty.The 20-
minute Adagio is exquisite, quietly securing the
appraisal that Mahlers Fourth is one of the most
evocative symphonies ever written. - James Rozzi

MOS DEF

Black on Both Sides (Rawkus)

Since Mos Def dropped his stellar first single,
"Universal Magnetic/in 1997, he has emerged
as the uhiquitcus poetic b boy - from co-owning
an African-American bookstore in Brooklyn to
appearing in a Visa commercial and on NYPD
Blue.: Last year's collaboration with fellow Brook¬
lynite Talib Kwefi ,Black Star, underlined the
renaissance of conscious hip hop. His solo debut
album carries on that tradition, fueled by urgent
calls for change delivered with singsong lyricism.
Whether he's encouraging self-knowledge in
"Fear Not of Man"or attesting to the power of
home in "Habitat" Mos brings the voice of the
underground to the masses. - Eric Demby

HENRI DIKGNGUE

Wa (Shanachie)

Those who equate the music
of Cameroon with the feverish,
rhythmic buzz of makessa,
zouk,and bikutsi will find
Dikongue a revelation Jhis
guitarist, vocalist, and song¬
writer works a decidedly
gentler groove. And while
his sound is essentially West
African, the influences of
samba, salsa, and reggae are
evident as well. Cue up"Nama
Po ula N de n a" and" Nd olo" to
experience the true breadth
oF the Cameroon sound,

- Philip Van Vleck

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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Pocket Portal

What's the secret ingredient
that suddenly made Sprint
such an appetizing takeover
target? Sprint PCS Wireless
Web r which lets you send and
receive email from compatible
cell phones, access ycur Web-
based address book, and cruise
any site that's been modified
for the small screen.

To check out the Wireless
Web r I used the sparkfy new
H P-1000 phone, made by
NeoPoint (see'The 11 Factor/
in Wired Tools)The InfoSpace
,tom service beats 411 In
tracking down phone num¬
bers via the Net. And if you
keep your My Yahoo! portal
current, the phone is a great
way to get your latest set of
names and numbers.

Using the phone's mini
browser is fun and even
quicker than my PC It reminds
me of surfing the Web using
the old, text-only Lynx browser
- there's no eye candy, but it
allows almost instant access
to data services. - Bob Parks

Sprint PCS Wireless Web: from
$50.99 a month for 300 voice/
data minutes for new customers.
Sprint PCS Phone NP-1000:
$399.99. Sprint PG: vmw
.spnntpa.com.

Words for Windows

When 1 laid eyes on the $50 behemoth of a book also known as the Encarta World
English Dictionary, only one word came to mind: hubris. It takes hubris to join the
august bookshelf lineup of Merriam-Webster's, Random House, and the king of
kings, the Oxford English Dictionary.

Creating a dictionary from scratch also takes cash - more than $8 million, in
this case, for three years of painstaking lexicogra phy by more than 320 specialists
in 20 countries. Led by the unimpeachable Anne Soukbanov (whiz of The Atlantic's
"Word Watch" column and once the queen bee at American Heritage's dictionary),
and carried out by London's Bloomsbury Publishing Pic, the team put together
400,000 word references, 5,000 biographies, 5,000 geographical references, and
thousands of special notes.

The definitions themselves are solid,1 compared Encarta J s entry for hubris with
Memam-Webster's and Random House's. Ail mention "excessive pride," but only
Encarta continues with "excessive ambition ... that usually leads to the downfall
of a hero in classical tragedy,"

Hooray, too, for the journalistic pronunciation system. ! find hyoo'briss much
easier to understand than the linguist's hyu-brss. 1 also adore the "Word Key: World
English"— little essays on 38 dialects, from Aussie English to African-American
vernacular. But there's something kooky about other special notes scattered
throughout, especially the random crash courses in cultural literacy. Take the
capsule on Francis Ford Coppola's Godfather movies, which concludes,"it brought
new meaning to terms such as godfather' and 'consigliere.'"This spirit carries
over into the word list. I'm all for digerati, dot , nose stud, Web site , and wannabe,
but keypall Sounds like AOL-speak.

Such slangy words make more sense in the digital version, which is a better
buy than the book [and easier to upgrade, too). The CD-ROM also includes a
Roget's,a book of quotations, a style and usage manual, a computer and Internet
dictionary, and an almanac. In other words, good ole Microsoft bundling.

- Constance Hale

Encarta World English Dictionary: $50, CD-ROM $39.95 Microsoft: +1 (425) 882 8080,

(800) 426 9400, www.microsoft.com/encana.

The Boy Mechanic

Most maverkk technologists of the boomer genera¬
tion have their roots In the 1950s ethos of Mr Wizard,
a world of adolescent boys and girls cooped up in
the garage cooking up bubbling mixtures with their
chemistry sets, or turning copper wires and wooden
dowels into Morse code transmitters. In the mid-'70s,
Jim Pomeroy channeled this young-inventor energy
into a low tech critique of a burgeoning high tech
culture. As revealed in a playfully designed, career-
en ca ps u lati n g ex h i bit ion, Jim Pom eroy: A Retrospective,
his interdisciplinary art found as much dazzle in
funky old technologies - stereoscopies, hydraulics,
zoetropes, faux finishes - as in new ones.

Pomeroy died in 1992 at the age of 46, but the
tenor of his work has relevance in the continuing
development of tech-based art. The exhibition
catalog, as well as the accompanying Web site
( www.jimpomeroy.com ), offers ample evidence of how
Pomeroy's wacky yet pointed inventions still man¬
age to generate wonder, social critiques, and belly
laughs. He made automated wind instruments from
cardboard tubes and vacuum cleaners, turned out
computer-animated satires on capitalism (with talking
dollar bills), and managed to use slide projectors and
convex mirrors to create an enveloping 360-degree
visual rivaling any VR arcade.

In the catalog, which reads back to front, cultural
critic Constance Penley describes Pomeroy's develop¬
ment as a "clockworklike morphing from the gee-
wbizism of his Mr. Wizard persona into the caustic
wit of his own version of Bertolt Brecht - with a dash
of Ernie Kovacs." Each may be spirits from the past,
but Pomeroy's synthesis of their wit, innovation, and
social relevance endures. - Glen Helfand

Jim Pomeroy: A Retrospective: $25. New Lang ton Arts:

+1 (415) 626 5416, www.newtangtonans.org.

WIRED DECEMBER ] 99 9

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OUTTA BET A A

OVD

Spin Doctors

The vast storage capacity of digital
videodisc has given the creators of the
DVD monthly Circuit free rein to over¬
produce the traditiona! music fanzine.
Viewers must slog through unreadable
menus with inscrutable names, then
endure long interstitial introductions
before finally getting down to the rock.

The meat of the thing - cool alterna-
bands like Cake, Wilco, Roots, Di Spooky,
Guided by Voices, and Grant Lee Buffalo
- is also hampered by unchecked cre¬
ativity, Each interview is amped up
with some annoying conceit; In one
section,the Cardigans go bowling and
the alley manager acts as interlocutor;
elsewhere, a very generous Beck must
converse with a stupid synthesized voice.

This attention to padding gigabytes
is the same impulse that killed the first
generation of CD-ROM magazines,
such as Medio Magazine (belly-up in
April 1995) and Blender (R.I.P., June
1997). But venues to watch good music
are scarce in the age of the all-sitcom
MTV, and Circuit sure can show videos.
If its creators would stop trying to
muck up the title's otherwise solid
content, I won't ever took at magazines
the same. - Bob Parks

Circuit. $ 14.95. Quit kBa n d Me two rk: {888)

383 6247, www.qUickband com,

RELEASE: SPRING 2 000

Fast Food

When you're late getting
home and company's due in

half an hour, it's nice to hurry
things afong by having more
than one form of culinary
physics on your sideJenn-
Air's Accellis oven bombards
food with microwaves, heat,
and forced air all at once,
cooking in as little as one-
fifth the time of conventional
ovens. A 3-pound chicken
comes out browned and crisp
in about 20 minutes - the
time it takes to make the
salad and set the table.
Microwave-convection
combination ovens have been
a secret weapon in commer¬
cial kitchens for years, but the
$3,500 Accellis brings the
technology to consumers,
who can now roast lamb
shanks as quickly as their
favorite bistro.To deflate
professional chefs further,
Accellis requires no special
techniques or preparations -
all you do is reduce the
cooking time. So shave
already and hit the shower,

- Paul Spinrad

Jenn-Air: (800) 5366247,
www.jennair.com.

Delicate Character

We may spend hours online, but for sheer reading
pleasure we choose paper over pixels. Yes, Web
libraries he at our fingertips, but computer displays
still can't match the clarity of a cheap paperback -
and if letters aren't ultra sharp, reading's no fun. A
brain that's busy deciphering characters can't enjoy
the story.

Microsoft Reader, out early next year, banishes the
72-dpi blues. The Windows application actually makes
reading long documents onscreen pleasant. Its un¬
cluttered interface shows only the text, rendering
fonts using Microsoft's ClearType technology, which
nearly triples the horizontal resolution of type on
color LCD screens. Future versions of Windows will
incorporate ClearType at the system level, improving
fonts in all applications. But for now, it works only
within Reader.

Here's how it works: ClearType controls red, green,
and blue subpixels individually, rather than as blocks.
Meanwhile, ClearType also adjusts the pixels to smooth
out diagonals and curves, eliminating jaggedness. For
black-and-white shapes, this set of optical tricks com-
bines to give onscreen type a quality approaching
that of print. As Microsoft VP of technology develop¬
ment Dick Brass explains, "All computer displays are
optical illusions. ClearType is just another eye trick,"

And not entirely new;Thts subpixel control is
something the Apple II did back In the 1970s.Type
designer Jonathan Hoefler also notes that to fulfill its
potential, ClearType may require new fonts, because,
as he says, "It's easier to design type around technol¬
ogy than to use technology to solve existing prob¬
lems with type"

On high-resolution screens, Reader renders stan¬
dard TrueType fonts beautifully. According to Brass,
Reader will be Tree or damn cheap," giving all the
more reason to go ahead and curl up with a good
laptop. - Doug Brightwell

Microsoft.+1 (425) 882 8080, (800) 426 9400 r
www. microsoft. com .

RELEASE: WINTER

Webbed Footage

The video store carries loads of old
movies, but television tends to disap¬
pear as soon as it's broadcast - which
is too bad, since TV captures moments
of earthshaking drama that other
media miss.

Yahoo's growing text-search able
video archive is adding image-based
search methods. Come December,
you'll be able to retrieve news dips by
color characteristics, so you can find
more hurricane shots or sunsets. And
simple face-recognition technology
will support searches by people
appearing in the shots. If you search
for Hiltary Clinton by name, you'll get
a lot of footage with people talking
about her. But search by name and
face, and you'll get dips of the
woman herself.

The free broadcast.com site, now
owned and run by Yahoo!, has been
aggregating content from hundreds
of broadcasters and sports teams, and
it's all being indexed with MediaSite
software, which - like rival system
VideoLogger from Virage - extracts
nonimage information from video, it
captures closed-captioning, recog¬
nizes where the camera cuts are, and
makes intelligent guesses about
when the topics change.

With all this newly available non¬
fiction video, expect some amateur
movie critics to turn into amateur
historians. - Paul Spinrad

Yahoo! Broadcast (formerly broadcast
,co m): index, broadcast com , Yahoo [ Broad ¬
cast: (800) 342 8346. MediaSite; +1 (412)
288 9910, www,mediasite.net.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

WAGE SECOND FROM LEFT: BRUCE WAG MAN

Don't go nut there pmptu-handed

World Wide Web prioritized.

ategorized and organized into

Finally a

search engine that delivers the
_—’_

Contributors

GAME

Thrash and Bum

Welcome to skateboard
heaven, fulI of gracefuI flight,
with just a hint of mayhem.
Visit a New York mall com¬
plete with escalators to skate
up and handrails to slide
down. Or conquer a Chicago
skate park, competing head-
to-head with pros like Kareem
Campbell. Designed with the
Interests of a true adolescent
male in mind Jony Hawk's
Pro Skater sets up ample stuff
to destroy:Vandalizing no
skateboarding signs and
picnic tables will earn you
the keys to the next course.

But slip up in the wrong
place and you'll slam so hard
you almost pity your onscreen
self. A taxi hit my skater
during the Minneapolis street
course, leaving him a man¬
gled heap on the curb. But a
moment later, he got back up
and pulled a 360 Madonna.

And that's what makes
this PlayStation game great:
Maneuvering highly technical
flips, slides, and massive airs
can all be accomplished
without sweating, breaking
your leg, getting hassled by
cops, or pissing off your dad.
-Adorn Glickman

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater for
PlayStation; $49,95. Activision:

+ 1(310)255 2000, www
aaivismxom.

BOOK

The Long View on Short-Term Profiteers

"A man has to guard against many things/'declared Jesse Livermore,"but most of
all against himself." A revolutionary new communications technology had made
it easy for Livermore to trade stocks instantly - so easy that his own foibles were
greater obstacles than any financial rules or regulations. Fear and greed had
become his twin mortal enemies.

Another hair-trigger trader just a few Net losses from a murderous rampage?

Far from It, though Livermore ultimately proved to be deadly serious about invest¬
ing: The technology that so altered his trading life was the telegraph. As Gregory J,
Mlllman chronicles in The Day Traders, intraday stock speculation dates back at
least to the 19th century, when Morse's wires began delivering price quotes to
Wichita as quickly as to Walt Street, Unregulated stock-trading "bucket shops"
opened nationwide, enabling people like Livermore, a Massachusetts farm boy,
to get rich in what had been a game reserved mainly for New York's wealthy. His
superanalytical methods made him $3 million in one day of the 1907 panic alone:
He shorted everything in sight just before the bottom dropped out. Of course, the
market can be a harsh mistress in the long term: Livermore's own great depression
came in 1940, when he shot himself In the lobby of the Sherry-Netherland hotel

Then as now - and violent outbursts aside - daytrading's great occupational
hazard is myopia. When you're obsessed with the next 60 seconds, the long view
hardly seems relevant, let alone worth reading an entire book about But a good
trader has to be able to feel the market like a sailor feels the water, so under¬
standing as much about the total environment - the market's structure, history,
rules, and heroes - is core knowledge that Millman ably imparts.

Buzzword-addied subtitle [The Untold Story of the Extreme Investors and How
They Changed Wall Street Forever) notwithstanding, Millman's book nicely illumi¬
nates some of daytrading's less hyped but more significant aspects. If The Day
Traders has a central lesson, it's the same gospel Livermore preached all his life:
Traders must exercise strict and total discipline if they are to stand a chance.

Less interesting is the month Mlllman spent In a daytradmg classroom, with
its predictably Gilligan's Island assortment of newbie traders and parade of big-C
Characters for teachers. Less time on the training floor and more time on the
trading floor would have helped the book considerably. And Millman's tacked-on
trading primer is no better than many of the other recently published how-tos.

- Steve Bodow

The Day Traders: The Untold Story of the Extreme Investors and How They Changed Wall Street
Forever, by Gregory J. Mlllman: $25.Times Books: (800) 726 0600, www.randomhouse.com.

Gregor Bo bo wick [gregar@bobowick.com) is a business
consultant and freelance writer.

Steve Bodow [sbodow@csicom) t a frequent Wired con¬
tributor, also codirects New York's Elevator Repair Service
Theater.

Doug Brightwell is a freelance writer and creative direc¬
tor based in Silicon Valley

David Cohen [davidycohen@yahoo.com] fives in London,
where he writes about technology for 73 and The Edge.

Eric Demby writes about music and New York City and Is
the music editor at Paper .

Adam Glickman is the US director and copublisher of
Toklon magazine,

Constance Hate loves words so much she's written two
books about them: 5m and Syntax (Broadway, 1999) and
Wired Style (Broadway, 1999).

Glen He If and iglen_h@sfdus.amt) is a freelance writer,
critic, curator, and former graphic designer,

Beth Johnson is a senior reporter at Entertainment
Weekly

Kourosh Karimkhany [kkarnikh@aol.com) is the senior
producer of a top-secret Internet startup

Sally McGrane is a technology and food writer in San
Francisco.

Mitch Myers (comefcacfttes.com) Is a psychologist and a
freelance writer. He lives in Chicago and Manhattan and
spends a lot of time on the phone,

Tamara Palmer is coeditor of URB and currently transmits
to Amazon.com, CDnow, and Flaunt from the depths of
San Francisco's west side.

j. poet [poebeat@earthlink.net) writes about world music
and pop culture for a variety of publications from a pink
Victorian flat in San Francisco.

James ftozzi [rozzll625@aoLcom) lives in Atlanta, where
he's a musicians teacher, and a local jazz columnist.

J, Schulz is vice president of marketing and corporate
communications for Medla0nDemand.com.

Scott Taves (stoitf5@teflprtef.com) is an entertainment
writer and digital strategist at online marketing agency
Quantum Leap.

Philip Van Vleck {pvv@hellsouth.net} covers pop music
and theater for the Durham He raid-Sun.

Got an idea for Street Cred? Email cred@wired.com.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

□ 90

Let it download!
Let it download!
Let it download!

Thinking of giving CDs as a holiday gift this year? Ho! No! No! Give the gift of downloadable music from
EMusic.com! Download the ultimate mix of Alternative, Rock, Hip Hop and Electronica —
even throw in a Christmas tune. Or, give a gift certificate so your loved ones can create their own
EMusic wonderland! EMusic is MP3 downloadable music from over 125 labels and more than 25,000
MP3 tracks. All for just 99(f a song and about $8.99 an album. That’s less than the cost of a CD.

And it's sure to get you a lot more action under the mistletoe!

EMusic.com The way to download.

fimusic

BEST

Time Capsules

FIRST CLASS:

Future Packaging Freedom

Team designed with an aerospace engineer specializing
in corrosion and materials testing, this monster-size
stainless steel box defines long-term storage, fust send
your timeless treasures to Future Packaging, and they'll
fill your box, condition the air inside, and weld the
whole thing shut. But make sure you follow the marking
instructions in the How to Bury manual, or construction
bots of the future might unintentionally bulldoze your
gift to posterity.

Freedom (18* x 18" x 3Q 11 ): $2,150. Future Packaging &
Preservation; (800) 786 6627, + 1 (626) 966 1955, futurepkg
, home, mindspring, com,

BUSINESS CLASS:

Barrtek Time Capsule 2000

The metal cap on this Vi-inch-tlikk aluminum cylinder
seals with 24 screws and comes in a choice of colors. As for
contents, Barrtek clients have ranged from 3Com to the
Singapore Department of Education to The Young and the
Restless, so there's room to stash a Palm, a cane, or Brash
A Sassy perfume, Pius, you may trick Y3K party dudes
into thinking they've unearthed a vintage can of beer.

Time Capsule 2000 (36" x 12", largest size): $750. Barrtek:

+ 1 (408) 779 23A5.www.harrfek.com.

COACH:

Future Archaeology Time Capsule

Made from dear, high-grade polymer PVC and sealed
with plastic end caps, this minimalist time capsule looks
like it was yanked from an underground plumbing
system. Little surprise: As every plumber knows, plastic
pipes resist corrosion well. The Future Archaeology
cylinder has no metal or rubber parts to deteriorate and
let moisture seep in, so your priceless (or worthless)
booty will stay safe and dry.

Time Capsule (24" x 4", largest size): $69.95, Future Archae¬
ology:+1 (212) 877 4310, www.fuwrearchaeotogycom.

Great stuff - tested and approved in our Y2K compiiant labs.

Portable Gas Generators

FIRST CLASS:

Robin RGV12000

With an output rated at 10,000 watts, this 310-pound
portable has enough juice to power up all of your home
essentials - refrigerator, freezer, furnace, stove, computer
- at the same time. There's even wattage to spare for
a nonessential or two. (Ftf, anyone?) The 22-horsepower
engine runs for 8.8 hours on a full 11-gallon tank of
gas and meets stringent EPA and California emissions
standards. An electric starter gets things going, and an
automatic idle control lowers the engine speed when
there's no demand.

Leatherman Wave

This stainless steel wizard shows how pliers distinguish
a top muititool from the knockoffs. The Wave's solid nee die -
nose/standard pliers head up a 17-tool combination -
from wire cutters to a wood saw - that adds up to the
most versatile switcheroo around. The locking blades can
he opened with one hand - essential for ladder use - and
the many snippers and screwdrivers let you take care of
business on the road or in the server room. Ergonomic
bonus: Beveled handles eliminate those palm-flesh
railroad tracks left by earlier Leatherman models.

RGVi 2000: $3 r 929. Robin America; (800) 277 6246,

+ 1 (630) 350 8200, www.robinomerica.com,

BUSINESS CLASS:

Honda EM5000SXK1

Honda brings its reputation for engine efficiency to this
It-horsepower, single-cylinder generator. A 4.5-gallon
tank of gas puts out 5.6 hours of 4,500-watt power -
plenty to keep your food cold and your family warm.The
generator automatically shuts down when the oil level
drops too low. And the four-wheeled frame makes
transporting this 193-pound power plant a cinch.

EM5000SXK1: $2,670. Honda:+ 1 (770) 497 6400, www
. honda-generators.com.

COACH:

Robin RGV2800

The 103-pound Robin puts a lot in a compact package -
but its rated output of 2,300 watts means you may have
to pick and choose what you run and when you run it
Still, the air-cooled, overhead-valve, 6-horsepower
engine uses its fuel quite effectively: A 3-galIon tank of
gas lasts for 9 hours. The extra-large muffler ensures
whisper-quiet operation, and the easy-pull recoil starter
and electronic ignition make this low-maintenance
generator virtually hassle-free.

RGV28QG: $960. Robin America: (800) 277 6246,

41 (630) 350 8200, www.rob!namericacom.

Wave: $98, Leatherman Toot Group: (800) 647 8665,

+1 (503) 253 7826, wwwJeatherman.com,

BUSINESS CLASS:

Gerber Multi-Plier Compact Sport

The Compact Sport's needle-nose pliers unsheathe at the
flick of a wrist - like a butterfly knife, but this one's legal.
The unit has nine other multitool essentials - including
scissors, knife, and Phillips and slot screwdrivers - and
each one locks open, so you'll never mash a finger, not
even one of those less-useful ones.

Multi-Plier Compact Sport; $72.50. Gerber Legendary Blades:
(800) 950 6161, +1 (503) 6S4 7008, www.gerberhlades.com.

COACH:

SOG Pocket PowerPlier

SOG is all about torque. Sure, safety and simplicity
are driving forces behind this combo tool set, but
the key is a system of gears that amplifies the smallest
amount of pressure into vise-tight compound leverage.
The Pocket PowerPlier opens one-handed and packs six
multifunction tools into its handles, including three
screwdrivers, a bottle opener, and a serrated blade.
Rulers in both centimeters and inches make life easier
for transatlantic tinkerers.

Pocket PowerPlier: $52.95. SOG Specialty Knives:

(88B) 764 2378, + ! (425) 771 6230, www.SOgknives.com,

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

rou digital

There's digital. And then there is Digital. The standard in optics _

meets omthe-edge technology Digital. The biggest name in cameras
on the smallest package Digital Extreme Digital. Canon PowerShot Digital.

Visit our website to see just how far digital has come.

TowerS^i;

Canon

www.powershot. co

r-i

Now, getting into your car doesn't have to mean
putting your life on hold. Whether it's providing
interactive entertainment real-time information,
or vital connections to home or work, Visteon's
innovative interior technology can enhance the
comfort and security of your life in ways never
before possible.

It's all about personal choice. Visteon gives
you the option to create an interior more
accommodating than your family room. Choose
a rear-seat entertainment system that includes
Nintendo 64®, a six-disc in-dash CD player, and
much more. Imagine having communication tools

that can even link you to the internet. Now use
the world's most advanced voice technology to
control it all safely— never taking your focus
from the road.

It's an interior built around the way that we
really live. A good example is a unique monitor
in the instrument panel that fets you watch the
kids in the back seat without turning around.

This-—and more—is available at Visteon
today. To leam how we can superintegrate these
and other advanced technologies into your vehicle
visit www.visteon.com or call 1 -800-VISTEON,
for innovation shaped by consumers.

World s Number One
Systems Integrator
Based on an
independent survey of
1,800 automotive Of

customers. Automotive Industries magazine

has recognized Visteon with Hs Quest for Excellence

Award as the Worlds Number One Systems Integrator

Visteon

Automotive Systems

Family room. Office. Daycare.

Iechnolocy that becomes a way of life

See the possibilities ~

Investment Savvy

Conference Call

NEW

if you're In the market for pomt-and-dick4G1(k) advice, you've likely heard of two Web
upstarts: Financial Engines and 401k Forum, Both deliver quick, customized counsel on how
best to allocate the money in your 401 (k) holdings, and both are a vast improvement over
snail-mai! worksheets and outmoded online calculators. But each company's approach has
shortcomings that a competitor, Team Vest, hopes to exploit

While Financial Engines offers individuals a retirement forecast free of charge, specific
investment recommendations cost $14.95 per quarter, 401k Forum's feedback is made avail¬
able only through employers who subscribe to the service. (Not a particularly forward-looking
approach, considering that most US workers job-hop seven or eight times over their careers.)
TeamVest, on the other hand, offers its forecasts and advice free (you do pay charges for a
one-on-one consultation with an analyst) and makes itself available to everybody: employers,
401(k) providers, and individual investors.

Like the others, TeamVest is Web based and fairly easy to use Just call up the site, answer
some questions about your age, goals, employer's 401 (k) plan, and risk tolerance, and then wait
less than a minute for it to recommend the best match out of 21 portfolios - generally consist¬
ing of mutual funds - culled from your firm's 401 (k) package. If the plan isn't in the TeamVest

database, the service will solicit a copy and add the plan to Its files. In exchange for helping
expand its roster,TeamVest will give you a year of its deluxe assistance free (a value of $340 to
$625), Intuit has partnered with TeamVest, which means you can also access the service through
Quicken.com. The two plan to expand this site so you can track all your investments there.

Financial Engines, admittedly, has a sexier methodology than TeamVest - the "engine," a
sophisticated computer model developed by Nobel laureate William Sharpe. But its recommen¬
dations aren't tempered as much by the common sense of financial professionals as they are
at 401k Forum and TeamVest. You might regard Financial Engines, with its formula-driven
technique, as the Inktomi of retirement planning, while 401k Forum and TeamVest are, with
their human editors, more akin to Yahoo! - Steve Mailman

401k Forum; www.401kforum.com.

Financial Engines: www.financiolengines.com,

TeamVest; wwwJeamvest.com, www.quicken.com.

Market insight came in at least 31 flavors at
Forbes' Telecosm confab - widely known as Gil-
derpalooza. Jt was loud and clear in the boasts
of Global Crossing's Gary Winnick, and equally
unsubtle in Peter Huber's pitch for American
Superconductor. But it also lurked between the
lines of grand pooh-bah George Gilder's acciden¬
tal aphorisms ("A circuit is like a long packet")
and in the bullet points of Kleiner Perkins VC
Vinod Khosla's luncheon presentation.

Winnkk's address came as Global Crossing
(Nasdaq; GBLX) completed its merger with Fron¬
tier Corporation and negotiated its purchase of
UK-based Ratal Electronics'telecom arm. Global
Crossing has been wiring the planet undersea
and, with the addition of Frontier's business,
now has more than 1.25 million miles of high-
bandwidth fiber connecting 170 cities in 24 coun¬
tries, and, courtesy of Racal, a major presence
in Europe. Until demand for bandwidth relents,
Winnick has a compelling story to tell investors.

"Every bit is an electron/' quipped Huber, "and
you can't have electrons without electricity."
Huber, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Insti¬
tute for Policy Research, rightly pointed out
that the new economy has radically increased
the demand for electricity - and, moreover, the
need for reliable energy. To track firms develop¬
ing new power technologies, he and Mark Mills
have launched the Haber-Mills Power Report. In
its inaugural issue, they tout American Supercon¬
ductor (Nasdaq; AM5C), a company that makes
superconductive materials - including wires
with many times the capacity of the old ones.

As for Gilder's crack about packets, he was para¬
phrasing a panelist, but his comment is instruc¬
tive; While some expected the Net to adopt one
standard set of routing devices, the Internet has
proved a mesh of many network architectures.

As such, those looking to invest in infrastructure
companies may be better off not betting exclu¬
sively on one approach. Instead, as Khosla said,
take seriously all those willing to cannibalize
themselves by developing competing technolo¬
gies and marketing new services. In short, look
for those who've taken to heart GE honcho Jack
Welch's Web-era watchword; Destroy your busi¬
ness dot com. - Brad Wieners

Global Crossing; www.globakrossing.com.

American Superconductor; www.amsuper.com.

@9D

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

NEW

The Wired Index

1996

1997

199B

1999

400

Sep Oct Nov Dec Jin Fob War Apr May iun Jul Aug Sop Oct Nov Dec Jan Fe6 Mar Apr May Jtm Jul Aug Sep Ort filov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jd Aug Sep

The WJred Inrte* tracts 40 puttie companies wHecttd by editors of Wired To serw as a hefiwether fur the new ettmomy. For a complete description and the latest results, see sJPcte.wffffctrom.
Some ol the companies m the Wired Inde* may have an admitting relationship with Reader w6o use this tnformaiiun (or investment-related decisions do so at their own risk-

The Wired Investment Portfolio

Primary Research

Thanks to bigdough.com, following the money
has never been easier. A Web-enabled, search¬
able database of institutional-investment
stock holdings, bigdough.com keeps tabs on
more than 25,000 portfolio managers, buy-
side analysts, hedge funds, and traders from
close to 3,500 North American and European
investment firms, and its listings are con¬
stantly updated by a team of 25 researchers
who cold-call portfolio managers and trawl
through SEC filings and the media, fishing for
fresh data. If you want to know who's holding
what, bigdough.corn's your Deep Throat.

Let's say you're looking at Exciteii-Home
and want to know who has a stake in it. At
www.btgdough*com, just click on Stock Owner¬
ship and pop in the company's stock symbol,
ATHM. Boom! Up comes a Web page with a
list of all 354 Exdte&’Home institutional
investors, as well as the value, percentage,
and number of shares in their positions, plus
a link to a page that shows the names and
phone numbers of the portfolio managers
who run the money.

For journalists, the time-saving benefits of
bigdough.com are obvious, but the service Is
equally valuable for financial officers, invest¬
ment consultants, and private investors trying
to spot trends or sneak a peek at the compe¬
tition's playbook. It's also one hell of a sales
tool for brokers and investor-relations pros.

Of course, not all information wants to be
free. Prepare to fork over $7,000 a year - at
least until bigdough.corn's more mainstream
discount advice service launches early in 2001.
Better still, sign up for the free 30-day trial,
show your bosses the service, and convince
them to underwrite a corporate account.

- Spencer £. Ante

bi gdou gh.com: www. bigdough. com .

Aggressive Rewards

Hype is good: Despite a bearish September, the WIP
raced up 13 percent on the strength of its tech and
Internet-media darlings. But in the spirit of not get¬
ting greedy. I'm cashing in the Liberate and Razorfish
shares and selling older positions in Liquid Audio

and juniper Networks,Two buys: Quokka Sports, a
sports-event broadcast portal, which is in a sweet
partnership with NBC for the next three Olympics,
and Safeguard Scientific^ an Internet-company
incubator that only sounds like a deodorant manu¬
facturer.- Jeffery Warded Ejwardell@hamquist,com)

1 Company

Duse 10/1

Current Value

A Since Purchase

Ad Force

Ad services

ADFC

6.000

24 V*

147,750

+ 6 %

America Online

Online services

AQL

5,000

107 %

539,375

+322%

AT&T

Telecom services

3,000

41 %

125,250

- 24%

AT&T-Liberty Media A

Cable programming

LMG/A

6,000

36 V,

219,000

+ 12%

Autoweb.com

Ecommerce

AWEB

6,000

54,000

- 63%

Gsco Systems

Network hw/sw

CSCO

9,000

68 Vi

619,875

+243%

CMGI

internet holdings

CMGI

1,300

99 Vis

128,944

- 11%

Microsoft

Software

MSFT

4,000

89 "A*

359,938

+115%

MP3.com

Online music

MPPP

5,000

180.000

- 9%

Pilot Network Services

Network sw

PUT

15,000

9 %

148,125

+ 12%

Playboy B

Publishing

PLA

7,500

25’/,.

191,719

+ 16%

RealNetworks

Streaming sw

RNWK

2,000

106 V*

212,500

+ 36%

SELLING

liberate

Software

IBRT

5,000

41%

206,875

+ 43%

Juniper Networks

Networking

JNPR

1,000

185 y«

185,031

+ 27%

Liquid Audio

Streaming sw

LQID

4,000

37 %

149,000

- 40%

Razorfrsh

Internet consulting

RAZF

5,000

41 Y«

205,938

+ 50%

BUYING

Quokka Sports

Internet programming

QKKA

20,000

137,500

Safeguard Scientific*

Internet holdings

SEE

2,000

69 u At>

139,750

Cash 5628,256

Portfolio Value 10/1

$3,831,856

Portfolio Value 9/1

$3,395,631

One-Mouth Portfolio Performance

+12.85%

Bussell 2000 Index

-1*73%

Hits fund slatted with 51 million on December 1,1994. Profits and losses are reflected monthly.

The Wired Investment Portfolio Itornwrty TWFT5} isa tnodel established by ftfued not an officially traded portfolio, JeRety Warden is a senior vice president in executive financial services at Hamtorecht &
Ouist lit and may have a personal Interest in stocks listed in the WIP The opinions expressed herem are those of the author <*nd not necessarily those tt H&QS research deparmwnt, HfiO has not verified the
mlurrnatjon contained in this article and does not make any representations as to its accuracy and completeness. Wired readers who use this Infomnaritti Toi Investment decisions do so at their ovrn risk

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

09B

Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown identifies the US investment banking activities of BT Alex Brown Inc. and Deutsche Bank Securities Incorporated
which eie indirect subsidiaries of Deutsche Bank AG.

Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown

Committed to technology.
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Internet Capital Group Inc.

Inktomi Corporation

$145 m Milan

£22 million

£370 million

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Agreed to be acquired by

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initial Public Offering

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Pending

September 1999

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Telogy Networks Inc.

Hotjabs.com Ltd

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Has acquired

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Ebay Inc.

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Has merged with

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Commitment is

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"When all else is lost/'wrote 19th-century author Christian Nested Bovee,
"the future still remains."

True, but the past hangs on pretty tenaciously, too. With the odometer
of history edging up to its triple-zero anticlimax, we can't resist giving a final
ovation to those people, things, and concepts that, having served their time,
don't need to cross the glittering rainbow bridge to the third you-know-what.

BY TIM CAVANAUGH

The space shuttle

Star Wars 2

Feng shui
Emoticons
Eyeglasses

Alexis de Tocqueville 6

What happens when a 194-year-old Frenchman with a
knack for observations so subtle, acute, and circumspect
they defy paraphrase gets roped Into service by every
Stateside blockhead who wants
to moon about the Genius of
the American Experiment?

At best, you get a Familiar
Quotations variety of mummery.

At worst you get George Will
(whq, come to think of it
should be on this list Himself)
and the art of judging our
contemporary mongrel nation
land finding it wanting} against
the imaginary standard of the
Anglo nation Tocqueville observed in the 1S30s.
Proponents of school vouchers or English-only ballot
initiatives should be able to make their cases without
compulsively reaching back to half-comprehended
philosophies written before the Gvil War (see "The Civil
War' ) or chloroforming the intellectual import of a classic
of political theory. In the future,all Americans should be
forced to read Tocqueville and forbidden to quote him.

Recovered-memory syndrome

Modern primitives 8
The Civil War 9

Recapping that final score; North 1, South 0.

The second gunman
Celebrity interviews
ActiveX

"I'm not a Luddite, but... " 13

TheTechnorealists, the Kirkpatrick Saleses,
the Stolls and the Svens, the Douglas Rushkoffs ...
are they really so different from us? Let us know more
about these noble savages, study their earthy ways,
teach them of our civilization and its might
Then we'll drag the bloody blowhards into
the modern age or kick them off the bus.

Nostradamus

Ulysses

"But I am going to finish -" No, youTe not.

Usenet
Gravity

The 24-hour workday
"When I was in Nepal..."

Glossaries of teenspeak

Yo, adults; Sometimes bad can
mean good\ We salute today's too infrequently sung
parents for making every effort to fathom their pustular
seed. And we suppose there's no avoiding the nifty
explanations of current teen lingo that appear at the
start of every school year in your local newspaper.

But given the combination of horror and envy with
which the culture at large views its young adults, these
perennially updated (but somehow always outdated)
slang dictionaries recall the Russian phrase books handed
out to the B-52 crews in Dn Strangebve , Do we really
need over-the-hill cool-hunters telling us the difference
between jiggy and krunkyl If you want to know how kids
talk, talk to a kid.They rarely bite unless provoked.

Lexis-Nexis

Church and state
Sex columnists
Dead batteries

26 Domed stadiums

Bars as a staple of nightlife

Enough already with the conversation-murdering
soundtrack, the sleeve dipped in countertop overflow
from a Miller Lite or cosmopolitan, the jacket that smells
like a Camel factory forever after. New places to meet
people are needed. New popular things to do are
needed. People need somewhere to go at night where
they can look good, hear each other speak, and not
return home reeking of vomit. Bring back dance hails,
bring back cocktail parties, bring back barn raisings or
quilting bees - bring back anything, but put some
oxygen into the vacuum of American nightlife,

Courtney Love

Luggage

Irony

Dieting

Anti-irony

090

to m

i -

-i

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

White stretch limos 32

Anime 33

Will that crazy Genma douse Ranma with warm water in time for
his/her wedding to Soun's daughter, or just turn back into a panda?
Could Mano Yohko defeat a mecha? Do women stop growing at 14?

Why does everybody look like Speed Racer? As we say
hajimemashite to the new millennium, let us bid sayonara to the
dewy eyes, schoolgirl outfits, and general creepiness of the most
annoying popular art form since mime*

Risk aversion

"Military intelligence. Now there's an oxymoron!"

The Bureau of Indian Affairs

Now there's an oxymoron.

Idea factories 57
"What's Sexy Now!"

The Apple religion

Two decades down the road, the Apple Revolution has succeeded
in about the same way most revolutions succeed: A core of true
believers remains, suspicious of all compromise, suspecting their
leader has sold them out, sustaining themselves with mulish
propaganda. (“Still the best graphics platform in the world!*
“Who cares about the business market?") Like most revolutions,
this one has brought more privation than liberty - nonstop crashes,
software famine, a customer-service department that would do a
Bolshevik proud. But these bourgeois concerns always meant little
next to the pride of being one of the Elect. Now that “Think
Different* is growing a bit long in the tooth, we suggest a new
battle cry for Appleniks, one that really explains why true believers
are willing to forgo the greater speed, power, and affordability of the
PCIt's not about satisfaction - it's about self-satisfaction."

The PC 40

Local TV news 41

Castro 42

By now, this is truly a no-hard-feelings selection. But since weVe
given up hoping that chest-thumping Yankee lawmakers and
hard-case exiles will ever stop despising their straw-man nemesis,
maybe we should just let the human life span work its diplomatic
magic. We want cigars, you want MTV. Surely we can strike a deal?

007 43

404 44

Antibacterial soap 43

Thank you. obsessive-compulsives,
for breeding soap-resistant supergerms.

Retro 46

Like accelerating contractions heralding some monstrous birth, the
cycle times of nostalgia (which In the 17th century was rightly
viewed as a mental illness) have grown alarmingly short. The '90s
saw not only a swing revival (scary enough, given that participants
had no actual experience of the original] but, a few years later,
a revival of the revival. Kids who don't remember the '60s are
condemned to relive them, and while “80s retro seems to have
collapsed under the realization of the decade's essential cultural
worth 3 ess ness, we suspect we're only in remission. We've already
seen the first stirrings of a grunge comeback, and we take no
comfort In the knowledge that whatever else today may be.
it's somebody's future good old days. Only the ongoing
communications revolution, with its empowerment of diehard
cultists, offers relief from the eternal return of retro: In the future,
nothing will ever go out of style, so nothing will ever come back.

47 Trilogies
41 Bouncers

41 Dumb prompts

“Are you sure you want to permanently remove these Items?*

50 interface metaphors

Few things have done more to set back the progress of technology
than interface metaphors. Being able to tell some hapless newbie
that "It's just like a telephone" may get the technophobic pants-
wetter over that initial anxiety attack, but It shackles the rest of us
to the ground. Its not a telephone, or a desktop, or a TV, or a tree, or
a conversation with a talking paper dip. It's a computer, and while
the kind of computer you actually have to deal with may soon be
rendered obsolete (see "The PC) by chip-enabled lawn mowers and
email-activated microwave ovens, let's get over the hand-holding.

51 Wrinkles

Metamedia
51 The penny
Inheritances

Do the math:Helr/heiress to large fortune = human train wreck.
Maybe you needed the summer home and the schooner...
but do your kids? It's time to rid the world of spoiled adults.

51 Rehab

Si Cops

57 Cops

58 Breast implants

Someday everyone will agree that they're about as attractive as
plastic covers on furniture or wax grapes in fake urns on living-
room walls. In the meantime, we'lf skip the health issues and the
unrealistk-body-image arguments and just say there's something
weird about an accessory you can never take off.

59 Tough-guy big-city columnists
6( First novels

61 Zero tolerance
6: Disintermediation
61 e-anything
6 l G lo ba IB u si ness Net wo rk

Undoubtedly, the life of a self-employed policy mandarin is a grand
one: living large with besotted CEOs who suck on the helium of your
big-picture bloviation; abstracting the world's problems until they
become an Avalon Hill strategy game; savoring the mood as your
dense and profound statements ("... In an era of dramatic change,
the future is very unpredictable") echo through the corridors of
power. And GBN - a sort of Trilateral Commission for the dltherati -
lives larger than most, peddling its dever aperpjs to corporations in
need of "seen a nos" for the future. We're in no way comforted by
GBISTs propensity for strenuously rendered idies revues. (Its recent
future-of-Japan study reached the stunning conclusion that Japan's
future would be influenced by an aging population, economic and
political change, ecological challenges, and geopolitical relationships.)
We all enjoy this kind of skylarking. It's just that most of us do it in
our bedrooms, with the doors locked and the radio turned up loud.

65 Leaf blowers

66 Elvis

77m Cavanaugh (tim#simpleton.com) is Suck's special guest editor
and sole proprietor of simpleton.com. Society left him behind some¬
time during the Carter administration.

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

□ 90

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Radio 67

Make no mistake, we love the serendipity of radio on a late-night
drive: the right-wing crank who suddenly makes sense of it aII; the
Jesus freak who catches your ear at the precise moment you really
need to be saved; the catchy jingle reminding you that, whatever else
may be wrong with the world. Art's Appliance Center will not
knowingly be undersold. But even with all this on one side of the
balance sheet, wouldn't you trade it for the assurance that you can
hear that Waitresses Christmas song ... in the middle of July?
Radio-on-demand is coming. More selection! No more Morning Zoos!

The modem scream 68

.com 69

Letterman 70

FDR knew that when an audience pities you, you're dead.
And when we see the man who practically invented the ironic
response settling into an unbroken mood of bitterness and
unprovoked spite, we just feel sorry for the guy. More to the point,
we wish he'd either get back some of his old mental discipline or
stop mocking us with the ghost of what he once was. Television
may be a fickle business, but sometimes it's not fickle enough.

Baldness 71

The golden age of television 72

Royalty 73

Thank you, kings and councillors, for getting us
to the third millennium. We'll take it from here.

Monaco 74

Multilevel marketing 75

Creationism 76

The latest ploy in the centuries-long crusade to refute natural
selection rests on a profound tautology: It seems Darwinism is
merely one theory among many. Never mind that all available
evidence supports this particular theory, that all efforts at dismissal
rest on willful misinterpretations and pettifogging about
"transitional species" and "gaps in the fossil record," or that the other
"theories" - that creation involved apples and talking snakes,
that the oceans formed from the sweat of Uranus, that it's turtles
all the way down - are fantasies unbecoming to a fcindergartner.

It's profoundly depressing that, even at this late date, the pharisees in
America continue to argue against all logic and evidence - that, in fact,
these arguments are gaining ground Rut it's just a blip - nothing, really,
in geological time.The great religions of the world have
withstood the march of science In the past, and the stupid religions
of America will absorb natural selection in the future.

In the meantime, let's give them a head start by consigning this
particular vestige of the Dark Ages to rapid extinction.

Designated hitters 77

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Urinal pucks 78

The two-party system 19
Webcam voyeur sites ID
Jet lag 31

AutoCorrect 82

Mischievous pixies who capitalize, rearrange, and draw jagged lines
under whole clauses - go away! Automatic spellchecker, outline mode,
anthropomorphic help system with nifty suggestions - you don't make
things faster, or easier, or smoother. You're a buttinsky looking over our
shoulders, a practical joker who jerks the top of our pen while
we're writing. We don't want you in our lives, and we shouldn't
have to pay for you in cash, load time, or system resources.

83 The Beats

84 The Beatles

85 Gum

86 90-second boot-ups
8, Oxygen bars
8; English

Do we really want a world language? The Renaissance didn't
get started until Europeans threw off the chains of Latin and
started using their native tongues. English may not have
reached this stage yet, but for Americans, Anglo hegemony puts
us at a strategic disadvantage: When they can all speak our
language and we cant speak theirs, you know they're taking
advantage of us.

89 Xtreme

90 Interruptions

9' internal combustion

"There is no application of power for which gas, oil, or petrol
engines are not only found suitable, but superior, to steam,
either from improved economy or running cost, or from
their enhanced power duty." So wrote engineer Edward
Butler back in 1912, when internal combustion still seemed
like a hot new thing. And, in truth, the strength of an
explosive-gas cylinder attached to a pump remains pretty
awesome even today. Rut it's high time we graduated to
dilithium crystals at the very least. Gas and oil power are
just too quaint for our age of nihilistic consumption.

When we can buy a nudear-powered Ford Explorer, then
well be impressed.

91 Spinning

93 Taut, lean, muscular prose

"It's bad,"Murph said. It's real bad."

M i know,"I said

"You should put it out of your mind."

*J know," I said.

9^ Batman

9! Hyper-equipped kitchens

What we don't want: the hot-dog cooker, the curly-fry maker,
the waffle iron, the juicer, the ice cream maker, the yogurt
maker, the fondue pot. fWhat we do want: the electronic
breakfast concierge. OK, and also George Foreman's Lean Mean
Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine.)

96 Forwarded email jokes

97 Hitler

Maybe we re just fed up with the History Channel.

(We're not quite convinced that the little "H" logo in the
corner of the screen really stands for "History.") Rut is there
anything left we don't know about the man? And isn't there
some more savory character to whom we can devote
those countless books, TV specials, mean-spirited comparisons,
and prebombing lectures on the folly of appeasement?

We've already given Hitler the better part of this century.

Let's start the next one off fresh.

98 Golf

91 Poetry slams

1R0 "That's so 20th century" i

Coming in January; Bruce Sterling's 2 Ht-Century In/Out List.

WIRED DECEMBER 19 99

□ 90

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I, Klaus

< 359 And you expel companies that no longer
measure up?

We have actively squeezed out a number of com-
panies because we felt they didn't fulfill the crite¬
ria anymore. We asked about 30 companies last
year and 30 companies this year to step down.

And did they go willingly, or did they kick and
scream?

Many have been very loyal over the years, so it's
not an easy process. But they are leftovers from a
time when we were much less able to be selective.
Do you do it personally?

It ends up on me, and this is probably one of the
hardest jobs I have. Sometimes we make a com¬
promise.

You describe Davos as a facilitator. Has it also
been an instigator?

In the early '80s, when the World Trade Organiza¬
tion was not yet in existence, ambassador
William E. Brock - who was then the US trade
representative - approached the World Eco¬
nomic Forum saying that he felt there should be
a new trade round on the rather delicate issues

of agriculture. So we got all the ministers related
to trade together to have an initial discussion in
Lausanne, Switzerland.The results were not too
encouraging because there was strong resis¬
tance by some developing countries. Still, we felt
we should go ahead. So we invited the top minis¬
ters to a private two-day meeting with the secre¬
tary-general of GATT, Even though there were
many problems, we still went ahead and met
again in the US. And out of that, the Uruguay
Round was formed when trade ministers finally
got together in Montevideo,

You must take pride in these breakthroughs.
Yes, of course! The WTO was one of the outcomes
of the Uruguay Round. Now, when I pass by the
WTO headquarters in Geneva, sometimes I have
this nice feeling that we had something to do

with the creation of this institution*

At the same time, the WEF appears to observe
a kind of code of discretion.

We had many discussions about whether we
should publicize the fact that we were the
point of origin - that we had started something
to facilitate world trade talks and afterward
the political machinery took it over. But my
colleagues and I felt, no - what we did is exactly
our role. And I am always hesitant to say Davos
was the first mover of anything. People often ask
me, "What role does Davos play in corporate-
merger discussions?" A merger is like two people
falling in love; It's a process* Sometimes we are
the place where the people first meet. Some¬
times we are the place where they do the
proposing. And sometimes we just provide the
beautiful sunset.

And personally, what is the payoff for you in
this work?

J have the biggest luxury one can have. I can be a
creator In a domain that has an impact on the
world* I also have the satisfaction of working
with a team that is committed to this mission.
Sometimes things do not go fast enough* You

feel there's such a lotto do;you have problems.
But Hike it*

Wouldn't you also like to make a lot of money?

I know that if I were to stop the forum or leave it,
I would definitely be able to find a position
where I could make more money. And at certain
times I've had offers that confirmed this, though
I'm not very interested*

But nonetheless, you like knowing that the
opportunity exists.

Yes, that I could do it if I wanted to* Of course, if
I wanted a fallback positron, I have my tenured
professorship. And I was very fortunate to join
the board of a high tech company, Ntxdorf, in the
70s.That had a big influence on my whole rela¬
tionship to new technology. Nixdorf was Europe's
Apple.lt was the highflier of the '80s. And I

joined just around the time it was going to go
public. I'm also on the board of a private bank in
Zurich, where I have served for 20 years* Let's just
say that being part of these companies, even
though I am not very involved, is profitable.
Although I never used my relations for my own
uses, being on the boards has enabled me to
have a more comfortable life.

You're not interested in having yachts or
houses around the world?

I have one of the nicest - but not one of the most
expensive - houses in Geneva, and I have a chalet
in the mountains. The rest I'm not interested in.
Running a nonprofit, you don't feel out of the
action?

I created a second foundation - called the Foun¬
dation for Social and Economic Development -
in 1998 that is quite successful in the Internet
and technology fields. We have three participa¬
tions* One is a videoconferencing company.
Advanced Video Communications, that we sold
to US Web/CKS last year* We entered into this
field after working on mediaconferencing at
Davos three years ago. Afterward we began
another small participation just to learn in a
direct way from the Internet world. So we created
an auction site, Industry to Industry. Lastly, we
helped create a software company, Think Tools,
which is a spinoff of the German government-
funded Max Planck Society.

It sounds to me like you might actually yearn
to be a businessman.

No, I do it as a hobby. I'm not a social man -
I usually come home from the office by 7 p.m.,
read the papers, have dinner with my wife, and
then, from 9 p.m. to midnight,l do my phone
calls to the States.That's when 1 work on Industry
To Industry* And! hope that at the beginning of
next year we can have an IPO. 8y the time of the
second round, we will have a valuation of the
company of about $70 million to $100 million,
which is not bad for something that started half
a year ago.

And the profit would go into the foundation.

Yes.

You aspire to have Davos be a place where
people can let their hair down. Does that
happen often?

Oh, yes. When Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov
was here last meeting - given his background,
everyone expected a relatively cold, forma! person.
But at the big Saturday-night soiree, we had a
special Russian room with Russian music, and in
he came and began singing into the microphone!
And you preside over all these affairs - 402 ►

“A MERGER IS LIKE TWO PEOPLE
FALLING IN LOVE,’’ SAYS SCHWAB.
"SOMETIMES DAVOS IS THE PLACE
WHERE THEY FIRST MEET. AND
SOMETIMES WE JUST PROVIDE THE
BEAUTIFUL SUNSET.’’

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I, Klaus

* 400 the formal and the informal?

You can imagine how many times people go off
after we have dinner or following an event to
have a drink at the bar and so on. But! cannot
remember onetime when I stayed longer than
10 minutes. Never.

So for you it's a question of finding the
proper degree of distance?

In being social, I have always had two fears: The
first was that I would lose my independence; the
second was that I would lose time. I have practi¬
cally no social life in Geneva because I find it a
waste of time. I have very few of what you would
call real friends* I know a lot of people, but I always
feel when I communicate with people and I con¬
vince people to do something, it should be done
on the basis of the strength of the idea rather than
because people find me nice or just want to do me
a favor. However, I have very good relations with a
lot of people. There is a small difference.

Have you never felt emotionally overcome by
a Davos "moment"?

Of course.There was the handshake between
Yasser Arafat and Shimon Peres. And then there
was the time Nelson Mandela turned to my wife
and said,"Take care of this man, because without
him the fate of South Africa would have been
different" Wei I, his words left me with tears in
my eyes. But the occasion that moved me most
of all was in 1988, when the Soviet Union was
still at the beginning of perestroika, and a Russ¬
ian dissident had just been freed from prison
where he had really suffered We caught him
practically at the border and brought him to
Davos, and he made a speech so moving that I,
and everyone else, had tears in our eyes. What he
had to say about freedom was made all the more
poignant by the recognition we all shared that
finally things were really changing in Russia*

Has your perception of greatness changed
over 30 years of Davos meetings?

In the beginning, I was impressed by someone
who had power. Now, 1 am far more impressed by
someone who has values. Power comes from the
outside, whereas deeply held values come from
the inside.

Have you ever been disappointed by an
attendee?

We have had politicians, and even well-known
businesspeople, give talks that have been pre¬
pared and written by someone else, and you get
the sense they have not even read the speech
before giving it* After all, you are invited to Davos

□ 00

in a personal capacity, to share your own ideas,
to be genuine. You should not recite someone
else's speech.

Where do you think you and Davos have failed?

I think we've failed in one way that we're now in
the process of fixing. The challenge has been,
How - when you deal with all these issues - do
you make sure that progress continues over the
course of the year? In other words, how do we
change the World Economic Forum from an
event-oriented organization to one that can
cumulatively build up knowledge? And how do
we store the tremendous knowledge created
during Davos and inside the WEF?

Why have we failed in this process of building
up knowledge? Because until now we did not
have the tools. Of course, you can capture words,
but that does not create knowledge; it creates
only data.

In 1987,1 made the first attempt to correct this.

I said that the forum should become a process
organization by using network technology. And
we formed a joint venture with DEC, because DEC
had developed Its own internal-communication
system* But we failed, because that system was
developed mainly for engineers, and it was also
too costly. Three years ago, we had discussions
with Andy Grove and concluded that the future
would be ISDN-based desktop med I a conferenc¬
ing, So we invested substantially in this area, and I
put together a staff to develop the concept and
integrate the technology that we called Welcom,
the World Electronic Community, into our work*
But once again, we failed. We were too early.
Multipronged desktop mediaconferencing still
has not really broken through. And now you have
such a fast move to broadband that ISDN Is prac¬
tically outdated. I mean, in the States nobody
installs ISDN anymore. It's already out.

Wouldn't you also include the art of forming
ongoing personal relationships as part of the
"knowledge” that needs to be saved?

The strength of relationships for the new genera¬
tion will come from a combination of face-to-
face and virtual communication.This is why the
video component - or now the Internet compo¬
nent - is so important.The new generation will
not find it enough to meet at a place like Davos
if an ongoing meeting doesn't also happen virtu¬
ally. There will be the expectation of a follow-up
mechanism. This means, as I said before, that we
have to build up a knowledge-and-interaction
infrastructure inside the forum* We have made
too many mistakes in the past on this, but we are
learning, and we will not fail this time. 404 ►

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I, Klaus

+ 402 What Is the WEF's current game plan?

My vision of the forum two years hence is of an
organization that meets regularly, but in the
meantime you can communicate on the different
issues in the form of a community-based knowl¬
edge hub - or you could call it a knowledge
portal - into which we may want to integrate a
video component later
The changes wrought by technology have
begun to alter the trajectory of human life.
What happens, for example, to the notion of
retirement?

This is one of the issues we are paying more
attention to in Davos. I think the whole notion of
aging will have to change in the future. Of
course, there is a physical limit, and death is very
much part of our lives. But you can remain cre¬
ative for - well, my mother was 92 when she
died and she would have been able to tell you
every German government member by name
and at least five American cabinet members as
well, which Is probably more than the average
citizen in the States could.

You are 61. Do you ever think about retirement?
I know CEO colleagues my age, particularly in
American companies, who retire. And I've dis¬
cussed retirement with my foundation board. But
1 feel more like a politician. I have a mission. Yes,

I will have to relinquish much more on the opera¬
tional side to make sure that I have good people
coming up. But on the strategic side, I think l can
still accomplish a lot, because ! have even more
credibility now and an even stronger network.
What happens, in the 21st century, to the
notion of generational divides?

To cast the difference between old and young In
physical terms is wrong. One member of our
foundation board recently used the terms AC and
BC: "after computers" and "before computers."
But it's not a line-zero mentality.There are 30-
year-old BCs - some are my students,and I am
still trying to reeducate them - while you find
more and more people who are 70 and use the
Internet for hours. What matters is whether you
keep your curiosity.

Is there an outer limit to your productivity?

I'm a marathon runner, 1 ski marathons, and I do
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In 1999, They Might Be Giants took on the
Internet, releasing the first MP3-only
album-long Tall Weekend [www.emu -
sic.com] and launching their own Web
radio station, Radio They Might Be Giants,
at www.wiredplanet.com.

TMBG is currently recording their next
album. Their track Dn Evil [the theme for
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Me }, hit stores October 26 with the release
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THE 1999 READERS 1 RAVES AWARDS

Celebrating the best in tech - the people,
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I, Klaus

* 404 winter benchmark. I told my board that
I would stay as long as I'm passing my tests.

How much bigger can the Davos phenomenon
grow - especially in light of a new virtual
component?

If you look at the world of the past and the world
of tomorrow,! would say Davos is a kind of com¬
mune of the global world. Communes are very
open and transparent.The world in general will
move back more to this notion of communes as
we had them in olden times.The difference will
be that the notion of the state will be strongly
supplemented by a sense of belonging to a mul¬
titude of other carefully selected communities,
through which you will create your identity.
Which will be more global in nature?

Which can be global or local. You may belong to
the local Rotary Club and at the same time
belong to the global Davos club.

What else do you dream of doing?

I have three dreams. The first is more or less
public,and I have discussed it with Kofi Annan.
The Nobel Prizes were created at the beginning

No, it could go to an individual or an organization -
or it could go to a government, which is something
very unusual.

And your second idea?

To create something I call Transition to Peace.
The Idea is that the international system fails in
places like Bosnia and Kosovo when it comes to
the peace process. Yes, the international commu¬
nity puts effort into maintaining order and
rebuilding civil society. But what you really need
in such a situation is to create something like
what Europe created after World War II. It's a
very complex situation, but we have started to
invite 15 to 25 people from each of four areas -
South Africa, Northern Ireland, Bosnia, and the
Middle East - for an exchange of experiences in
Davos. We've had several meetings, and they've
formed small task forces. We will bring them
together again in the autumn. We have also
established a Web site where we list projects
[www.wefofum.org/ttp). I'm not yet satisfied,
because I cannot put the necessary financial
means into it, but I'm hoping to build Transition
to Peace into a movement and an organization.
What I'm interested in is not the whole process

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of the 20th century around those fields that
really influenced the century: physics, chemistry,
medicine - the hard sciences - and then, of
course, there is literature, the peace prize, and
the economics prize. I would like to build a kind
of Nobel Prize for the 21st century that would
honor social entrepreneurship. I'm thinking that
there could be three domains for such a prize:
sustainable development, which means the
environment; human development, or what you
could call education;and social development.
But unlike the Nobel Prizes, the money would
not be used personally - it would go to the
cause or organization for which the prize was
awarded.

So it wouldn't necessarily be awarded to an
individual?

of peacemaking, but that of peace building.

And the third dream?

Creating a Center for the Global Agenda, a kind
of think tank - a hub, really - to undertake activ¬
ities on crucial global challenges. We would work
with everyone in the world who wanted to con¬
tribute to such an effort.

This sounds like a perfect next job for Bill
Clinton. Have you ever spoken to him about
joining forces?

Well, let me just say that within this framework,
our idea is to create some senior-fellow positions
that could be in residence or not. [ could imagine
that such positions might be of interest to for¬
mer heads of state.

You're an ambitious man.

My wife would say I'm a reckless man.* a a

Go farther.

□ 00

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□ 20

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

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U 20

WIRED MARKET

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Wired Celebrates the millennium with a
milestone special issue: World's Fair 2000.

Don't miss this opportunity to

advertise in this one-of-a-kind Collector's Edition.

Issue Date: January 2000
On Sale Date: December 14,1999
Materials Close Date: November 1,1999

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Closing Dates:

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25,1999, Issue 8,02 dos¬
es November 22, 1999

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020

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education E-mail: q45@vfs.com Web: www.vfs.com

ADVERTISE IN WIRED MARKET

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www.starsedge.com/ rewire
or 1-800-589-3767

Newsstand sates are up 10% - 32% over last year
Subscriptions are up by 50,000 plus per issue

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Unique and Effective Platform For
Advertisers;

WIRED Market ad pages have increased
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Stotirce: Publisher, July 1999

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fust imagine how much easier if would be to find her if Law enforcement actually had a current picture* The fact is,
1 out of every 7 missing children are found because someone saw their picture. That's why the National Center for
Missing and Exploited Children and Canon are asking you to keep updated photos of your children. And to look at
pictures of missing children carefully Because a picture is worth more than a brief description.

Click on www.picturcthemhome.com for more information. Picture Them Home. &sH

Colophon

Wired is designed and produced digitally.

Our thanks to the makers of the following:

Hardware

Apple Power Macintosh G3 desktop, I Macs, and PowerBaok computers;
Agfa SelectScan Plus, Duo5canT200D XL, Arcus II, and Vision 35 scanners;
Radius PrecisionView and Intel I iCo I or Displays; Sony monitors, Apple
LaserWriter 16/600$ and color 12/6005, Hewlett-Packard LaserJet 5s|
and 4mvs, and Xerox Regal 5790 digital color copier/printer; SuperMac
Splash; APS, MkroNet, and La CEe storage media; Iomega Zip and Jar;
Yamaha CDR 1G0; Micro Net DDS-2 and DLT drives and autoloaders.
Software

Word processing and tracking: Microsoft Office 98.

Page layout, illustration, and graphics support: QuarkXPress;

Adobe Acrobat, Dimensions, Illustrator, Photoshop, Premiere, and
Streamline; Equilibrium De Babe I izer; Macromedia Fontographer,
Symantec Suitcase.

Typography: Tent: Adobe Myriad and Wiredbaum; Heds: Adobe,
FontShop, FUSE, Huefler Type Foundry, House Industries, ICG, [T-26].
Networking; Cisco enterprise routers and switches; 3Com hubs;
Apple Work Group Servers with AppleShare IP; Shiva LanRover/E Plus;
3Com external and PC card modems; Dante Retrospect 4.1; Farallon
Timbuktu Pro 5.0; Qualcomm Eudora Pro 4.2; Neon Softwares
CyberGauge 2.1; Dartmouth College's Intermapper 2J; Sustainable
Soft works IPNetMonitor 2.3; Peter Lewis' Anarchic 3.5; InTrec
Software ProTerm 1.2.5; AG Groups EtherPeek 3.5.4; Aladdin Systems'
Stufflt Deluxe 5.1.2; Jim Matthews' Fetch 3.0.3; Microsoft Internet
Explorer 4.5; Netscape 4.6.1.

Electronic prepress and printing by Quad/Graphics lnc„ Saratoga
Springs, New York.

Color separations are made oo a Linotype-He!I ChromaGraph 53900.
Initial color corrections are performed on Apple Power Macintosh G3s
in Adobe Photoshop and then proofed on the paper stock using a
Kodak Approval digital col or-proofing system. Additional electronic
prepress is performed In-house at Wired using scans from the 53900
and Agfa SelectScan Plus, DuoScan T20QQ XL, Arcus II, and Vision 3S
scanners. Composed pages are converted to PostScript through a
Sritex Brisque and translated Into Scitex language using software
version 2.2. Composed digital proofs are submitted for final approval.
Final Images and text are electronically imposed using a Creo Thermal
Piatesetter 3244, Printed on multiple Heidelberg Harris M-1000B web
presses and bound on a Heidelberg Harris Falcon 232 Perfect Binder.
Printed on paper from Bland in and Inter Lake Papers.

Cover: 8Qtf/8 Ltthoweb Dull Cover; Text: 40Intrepid LoGlare.

Things we wish we could leave behind:

Jlggly Puff; JPEGs; sniveling writers; Comhole; QuarkXPress 4.04; Kid Rock;
midget chic;low-slung"; ASP; George Will; Will Smith; Smith & Wesson;
■'WessonsIrty r; Windows 98; advertorials; Fiona Apple; Remote Access;
bicycles, tennis rackets, and hairs; "La Vida Loca";MUNI; radical optimism;
revolutionary uplift; Tommy Hilflger couture; Bondi blue; mixed greens;
Tokyo Extreme facer; working holidays; militant antismokers; Y2K; Korn;
Kevin Costner; cotton lingerie; startup culture; Buffy the Vampire Slayer,
black licorice; PMS 810; Gwyneth Paltrow; 200 Cigarettes; virtual reality;
floppy disks; David E. Kelley; Internal page references; wwwJyeosxom ;
the Gap; tabs; Sheryl Crow; 5NL; PacBell; Chalupas; the Web.

Wired , December 1999, Volume 7, Issue Number !2,

Wired is a registered trademark of Advance Magazine Publishers Inc.,
published through Its division, The Cond£ Hast Publications Inc.
Copyright ©1999 by The Condi* Hast Publications Inc. AH rights
reserved. Wired (ISSN 1059-102811 is published monthly by The Cond£
Na&t Publications Inc., Condo Nast Building, 4 Times Square, New
York, NY 10036. Steven T. Florio, President and Chief Executive Officer;
David B.Chemidlin, Treasurer; Jill Bright, Secretary.

Subscription rates: In US and possessions, US$24 for 12 issues, 544 for
24 Issues. In Canada, US$40 for 12 issues (includes GST and H5T where
applicable). Elsewhere, U5570 for 12 issues, payable in advance.
Occasionally, we make our subscriber list available to carefully screened
companies that offer products and services we believe would interest
our readers. If you do not want to receive these offers and/or information,
please advise us at PO Box 55689, Boulder, CO 80322-5639.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Wired, PO Box 55689, Boulder,
CO 80322-5689.

October's answer: Radius
Defense's Pi 0 underground
disaster shelter, which houses
up to 10 people Long-term,

20 short-term.

Competition Rules (Seepage432.)

1 NO PURCHASE NECESSARY.

2 . To enter online or via standard mail, please send an email or a postcard stating the
entrant's name, address,and telephone number and correctly identifying the item
shown, and its function, In this month's installment of the "Whit Does It Dti?" contest,
according to the Insmtftiom given on (he feature page

3. To enter via email, entries must be sent to
what de ce/7itar# wired.com

To enter via standard mail, entries must he sent to
Wired “What Ones It Dor Contest
Department 991201
PO Ron 10129
Riverton, NJ 0BQ76-Q3Z9

All entries must be received by 1159 p,m. Pacific time on the 10ih day of the month
following the issue month. Entries that are lost, late, misdirected garbled, postage due,
or incompletely received for any reason,including by reason of hardware, software,
browser, or network failure, malfunction, congestion, ot incompatibility at Wfredor
elsewhere, will not be eligible.

4 . Onty one correct answer will be registered per entrant per month. Contestants who
have one registered correct answer at the end of the contest period Ion or before
January 1D.20QQ) will have one entry in the grand prize drawing; contestants with a
total of two registered correct answers will have two; and so on. Wired reserves the right
to discontinue the contest at any time, in which event the prize will be awarded bawd
on entries received to date.

5. One grand prize winner of the "What Does It Do?" contest mil be chosen on or before
February 25,2000, In a random drawing of qualified entries that have correctly identified
Items and functions in the "What Does It Do?" contests published In 1999. The winner
will be notified by phone or mail within two weeks of the drawing. If the winner cannot
be personally contacted within 30 dayman alternate winner may be chosen. All decisions
by thefudges are final.

6. The grand prize winner will receive a Hariey-Davidson XL 12005 Sportster 1200 Sport.
The grand prize is not transferable, No substitutions for (he grand prize will be allowed
except by MnevJm case ot unavailability, in which case a prize of equal or greater value
will he awarded, t he retail value of the grand prize Is approximately $8,500.The winner
must have a valid driver's license ihat allows use of the prize, and is responsible few oh-
lalning and providing evidence of insurance and for all registration, title, and other fees.

7. Income and other taxes. If any, are sole responsibility of winner.

8. The'mat Does It Dor contest is open to residents of the United States or Canada
(excluding Quebec) who are 18 years of age or older as of the date oT entry, except for
employees of CornW Nast Publications,the fulfillment house for this promotion,
contributors to Wired, and the families of any of the above.

9 The Wired "What Does It Do?" Contest Is subject to all federal, state, local, and
provincial laws and regulations. Void in Puerto Rico, the Canadian province of Quebec,
and where prohibited. If the win ner is a resident of Canada, the winner may be required
to correctly answer a time-limited arithmetic! sidli-tesfing question

10. Odds of winning the "What Does it Do? rf contest depend on the number of correct
entries received.

11. All entries to the "What Does It Dor contest become the sole property of Wired, a t
Wirerfs sole discretion, and will not be acknowledged or returned.

12. Acceptance of the grand prize constitutes consent to use the winner's name and
likeness for editorial, advertising, and publicity purposes I except where prohibited by
law). The winner may be required to sign an affidavit of eligibility, as well as a liability
and publicity release, which must he returned within 30 days of the date of notification,
or an alternate winner may be chosen.

11. Contestants, by entering the “What Does It Dor contest, agree to be bound by the
above rules and regulations.

14. For the name of the grand prize winner, send a self-addressed, stamped envelope
after February 25,7090, to Wired'What Does It Do?" Contest Winner, 520 Third Streel,

San Franrisco, CA 941 07-1815,

The Wired "Return to Sender" Contest
Official Rules (See page 71.)

NO PURCHASE NECESSARY TO ENTER TO WIN

The Wired “Return to Sender" Contest Is sponsored by Wired, 5 20 Third Street, 3rd Flow,.
San Francisco, tA. 94107-1815 (“sponsor*). Eligibility; Contest is open to residents of the
United States and Canada (excluding Quebec), except employees of Wired. Enter by
sending in your postal art (any mailable object) for consideration, along with ynyr name,
address, email address [if any), and telephone number, to Wired, 520 Third Street. 3rd
Floor, San Francisco, CA 94 T07-1ST 5. Entries for the March 2000 issue must be received
no later than December 1,1999. One winner will be chosen bawd on the most unusual
entry on or about December 10,1999. One entry per person permitted. All entries become
the property of the sponsor and will not he acknowledged or returned All decisions by
the Judges are final. Grand prize (1):one (T) Wired T-shirt (approximate retail value S30J.
Void in Puerto Rico, the Canadian province of Quebec, and where prohibited. If the winner
is a resident of Canada, the winner may be required to correctly answer a Time-limited
arithmetical skill-testing question.Subject to all federal,state,local, and provincial laws
and regulations. Income and other taxes, if any, are sole responsibility of the winner.

For name of the grand prize winner, send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to Wired
'■Return to Sender" Contest Win nerfMareh), 520 Third Street, 3rd Floor, San Francisco,

CA 94107-ISIS after December 19,1999. Acceptance of the grand prize prize constitutes
consent to use the winner's name and likeness for editorial, advertising and publicity
purposes without farther compensation (except where prohibited by law).

Statement of Ownership, Management and Circulation
(Required by 39 U.S.C. 3685)

1. P u b I i c at ion title: Wired,

2. Publication number: 011-724.

3. Filing date: October 1 r 1999,

4* Issue frequency: Monthly.

5, Number of issues published annually: 12.

6, Annual subscription price: $24.00.

7* Complete mail mg address of known office of publication:

520 Third Street, San Francisco, C A 94107.

8. Complete mailing address of headquarters of general
business office of publisher:

520 Third Street, San Francisco, CA 94107,

9. Full names and complete mailing addresses of
publisher, editor, and managing editor:

Publisher: Drew Schutte, Advance Magazine Publishers Inez.,
published through its division,The Conde Nasi Publications,
520 Third Street, 5an Francisco, CA 94107.

Editor: Katrina Heron, 520 Third Streel, San Francisco,

CA 94107.

Managing Editor: Kris line Kern, 520 Third Street, San
Francisco, CA 94107,

10, Owner: The Cond£ Nast Publications Inc. 4 Times Square,
New York, New York 10036. Through intermediate corpora¬
tions to Advance Publications Inc.,The Advance Voting
Trust, sole voting stockholder, 950 Fingerboard Road,,
Staten Island, New York 10305,

11, Known bondholders, mortgagees, and other security
holders owning or holding 1 percent or more of total
amount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities: None.

12. N7A

13, P u bl i c at ion na me; Wired,

14, Issue date for circulation data below: October 1998-
September 1999.

15. Extent and nature of circulation:

Average Number of Actual Number of Copies
Copses Each Issue During of Single Issue Published
Preceding f 2 Montiis Nearest to Filing Date

Total no. copies (net press run]

700,227

637.890

Paid and/or requested circulation

1, Paid/requested outside
country mail subscriptions

400,014

151,914

2, Sales through dealers and
carriers, street vendues,
counter sales* and other
non-DSPS paid distribution

99,761

1-05,000

Total paid and/or requested
circulation

499,775

456,914

Free distribution by mail

16,520

12,679

Free distribution outside the mail

6,517

7,052

Total fiw distribution

23,030

19,731

Total distribution

522,813

476,645

Copies not distributed

177,414

161,245

Total

700,227

637,890

Percent paid and/or requested
circulation

95.59

95.86

1 certify that all the information furnished on this form is true
and complete. I understand that anyone who furnishes false or
misleading Information on this form or who omits material or
information requested on the form may be subject to criminal
sanctions (including fines and imprisonment) and/or civil sanc¬
tions (including multiple damages and civil penalties),

(Signed) Charles H.Townsend, Executive Vice President

030

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

WHAT

That sloppy quartz thing
on yoyr wrist isn't good
enough. The obsessively
precise prefer this combo
freezer-microwave-partide
accelerator, which launches
and tracks cesium atoms.

In 2003, it journeys to the
International Space Station
- a trip that its gravity-
dependent forebears would
not survive. And unlike
the older models, this
Parisia n contraption
with an Egyptian name
supercools its atoms,
making their travel times
longer and more regular.
Far more regular. Which is
the entire point*

What is it, anyway? And
what does it do?

THE WIRED CONTEST

The rules: For a chance to get out
and enjoy the open road on a Harley-
Davidson Sportster, identify the item
pictured at right (by manufacturer
or designer! and its function . Correct
entries will be placed in a random
grand prize competition with one
winner drawn early next year awarded
a Harley-Davidson XL 12QQS Sportster.
Enter online at www,wi redeem
/ w i red/a rch ive/7.12Avhat.html. For
confesf rules, prize information , and
the answer to October's ''What Does It
Dor see page 431

WIN A HARLEY-DAVIDSON
XL 120 05 SPORTSTER

WIRED DECEMBER 1999

ilut m me mm, ABSOLUT

fOGBAPH BY STFVE BRGNSTEIN.

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